The Wireless Web - Wireless Industry News - Wireless Stats

Stats for Russian & Ukrainian Wireless Penetration

2007-10-17T06:09:00.000-07:00

As of October 2007:

Russian Penetration: 114%
Moscow: 170%
St Petersburg: 147%
Totals: 1.6 million in Sept 2007 for a total of 165 million

Ukrainian Penetration: 115%
Total: 54 million

Is that crazy or what?

Is There Nothing New In The World Of Wireless?

2007-08-16T12:15:00.000-07:00

There's nothing new in the world of wireless!!!

Really, is anything coming this year? 2007 has been pretty quiet except for the iPhone. But I'm not even really referring to new phones.

Let's look at what wireless has given us in the last few years:

Better text messaging (SMS)
Launch of inter-carrier SMS (ICMS)
Global ICMS (GICMS)
Multi-media messaging (MMS)
ICMMS
Satellite radio on your phone
MobiTV
Downloading movies on your phone (ok, this is really still just hitting us right now)
Better ringtones
Downloading of full-length songs
Better video games
Multi-player video games
Social networking on your phone (MySpace, Facebook, YouTube)
Better GPS apps
Video conferencing (not mainstream yet)

I guess we're still waiting for:

Global ICMMS (I'm sure it exists, but not at my telco, I think)
Live TV
Abolishment of CDMA networks and migration to GSM
Two-way compatibility between iDEN and VoIP push-to-talk PCS phones
Better camera phones (they ARE out there somewhere; my buddy just showed me a 5mp camera phone he ordered from China)

Wifi-capable phones that work on your carrier-provided wifi router at home for FREE, also giving you perfect in-door coverage; then when you go outside, your phone reverts back to working off the carrier's sites

M-Commerce: when the heck are we going to be able to buy things in stores by flashing our phones in front of a terminal? What's the hold-up? Back in 2001 I bought a soda-pop from a vending machine by using my phone; granted, it was at a wireless convention, but why the heck has 6 years gone by without these vending machines being EVERYWHERE?

Hmmmm...I feel a rant coming on.

Could you PLEASE tell me what I'm missing?

WHAT IS THERE TO LOOK FORWARD TO IN THE WORLD OF WIRELESS IN 2007 OR 2008? Please comment on this post.

Indian Mobile Subscriber Additions for July

2007-08-10T13:53:00.000-07:00

Look at some of these stats for India:

Bharti Airtel: 2.1 million new adds in July Total: 44.8 million

Other Totals

Idea Cellular: 17 million
Bharat Sanchar Nigam: 30 million
Vodafone Essar: 32 million
Mahanagar Telephone Nigam: 2.7 million

High End Smart Phone Users Want Games Too

2007-08-10T13:46:00.000-07:00

The mobile phone gaming industry accounts for about 700 million dollars a year in North America.

Some of the gaming companies are turning their eyes towards high-end smart phone users, such as Crackberry Addicts, Qusers, Treos, and the iPhone.

Some of those companies are EA Mobile, Gameloft, Glu Mobile, Magmic, Popcap Games, and Handango.

Are You "Highly" Interested in Buying the iPhone?

2007-06-19T06:50:00.000-07:00

In a recent survey, it was found that 19 million cell phone users in the U.S. are "highly" interested in buying the iPhone this year.

Over 12% of T-Mobile clients are also highly interested in moving over to AT&T to get the iPhone.

8% of Sprint Nextel clients expressed the same interest, and close to 7% of Verizon clients said the same thing.

Also, 40% of the calls/emails AT&T receives regarding the iPhone are from non-AT&T clients.

AT&T is going to be a busy place soon!

Apple forecasts selling 10 million iPhones by the end of 2008, so obviously, all 19 million of the highly interested purchasers in the U.S. are going to have to wait. But keep in mind that being interested and actually acting on that interest are two different things.

And what about the rest of the world? How many iPhones will be sold in other countries? (it turns out that the iPhone won't even be available in Europe/Asia until well into 2008)

Are YOU "highly" interested in buying one? What provider are you leaving?

Feel free to comment. :)

HTC "Touch" Is Competition to Apple's iPhone?

2007-06-06T10:24:00.000-07:00

Have you heard the hype about the new HTC Touch phone as being a possible Apple iPhone killer?

No one understands.

The Touch will not even come close. It will fall into obscurity like all the other PDA phones out there.

Why?

Because it uses an expandable SD card for memory expansion.

Why does that matter?

Let me ask you: do YOU like buying memory cards for your phone? Do you like fumbling around with that little card?

Do you want to go out and purchase a bigger memory card right after you dropped hundreds of dollars on a phone that is supposed to be the Holy Grail of all phones?

No, I'm sure you'd rather do what Apple is suggesting: buy an iPhone and be done with it!

No fooling around with delicate little cards. No shopping around online or at various malls in order to find the cheapest price on a 4Gb card. Seamlessness. Simplicity. Not complications.

The sooner manufacturers figure out that iPhone is outselling their own "copy-cats" because IT IS A HARD-DRIVE PHONE, the better.

Why are iPods selling better than the mp3 players that were around before iPod? Because they're hard drives.

Why will iPhones sell better than mp3 player phones? Because they're hard drives. (OK, so they're NOT really hard drive phones...YET. As Stewie pointed out, right now iPhones just use flash memory)

It's clear to me. It's unclear to manufacturers and wireless providers.

I have a message to all the manufacturers & providers: when you finally figure out that what I'm saying is right, you can send me checks for what my advice is worth!

Wireless Penetration Stats

2007-05-28T07:53:00.000-07:00

HUNGARY: In April 2007, mobile phone penetration went to 100.4%. Of course, there's only 10 million people there....

CHINA: China Mobile added 5.28 million users in April. Now they have 321.4 million subs. That's just one carrier!! Sorry; don't have the current penetration rate for China.

RUSSIA: in April they're up to 108%. Moscow: 162% St. Petersburg: 142%

UKRAINE: they just dropped from 107.9% to 107.7%!!! This is because some operators there stopped counting active phones that have zero usage.

CANADA: 54%...or is it 56%? What's wrong with Canada??? Why don't Canadians buy cell phones??? Some say it's because Canada has the highest wireless phone rates in the world. Why? I wonder if it just costs more to build out a wireless network for the biggest country in the world yet which only has about 34 million people.

Do You Have an LG Wireless Phone?

2007-04-18T09:27:00.000-07:00

What do you think of LG and their phones?

Sometimes I wonder if LG has decided yet what their business is going to focus on. Can they spread their focus all over the place...onto fridges and washing machines...and then pull off a quality wireless phone?

Sure, they have about 6% of the phone market, so they should know what they're doing by now.

But look at all their phones with stubby or internal antennas. I can't tell you how many times I've heard people say that they used to have great RF signal out in the country or indoors, but after buying an LG, all of a sudden, their service has degraded. I also hear a lot of that when LGs roam onto other carriers.

Sorry if that sounds bad, but it's the feedback I always get.

I have experienced the above as well, but my wife does have a stubby LG245 right now and I'm very happy with it. It works fine. I love the way it feels. So, do some work fine and others don't?

I also have an LG8600, the Chocolate Flip, which seems to have great RF performance, but the audio quality is a bit like a tin can.

I can go on a bit and talk about some dB testing we've done and how the LG fared against some other handsets, but let's leave that for another day.

I want to be FAIR and unbiased. What do you think? Can LG improve their wireless phones? Can they improve their designs too? Have they ever hit a home run in the area of design? Is their Chocolate a "big-thing" yet?

Feel free to comment below.

Mobile Phone Subscribers in Russia

2007-04-13T06:29:00.000-07:00

As of April 2007, there are 155 million mobile phone subscribers in Russia. 1.6 million new adds were reported for March.

Moscow penetration is at 161%
St Petersburg is at 160%

China Mobile Subs Added in Feb 2007

2007-03-22T06:36:00.000-07:00

Wow, China Mobile added just shy of 5 million subscribers in Feb 2007.

5 million!!

Get Paid to Upload Your Mobile Videos on "See Me TV"

2007-03-09T06:16:00.000-08:00

Here's something I wish we had in North America:

There's a European wireless provider named "3", owned by Hutchison Whampoa, that has launched a service called See Me TV. It allows you to watch various videos on your cell phone, for fees that range between 20 cents and $1.35.

But it also allows you to upload your own videos and share in the revenue when others watch it. You will then get paid via PayPal.

I believe all their videos are user-generated content.

This reminds me of metacafe.com and revver.com which also share revenue with their video uploaders.

Hungarian Mobile Penetration Rate

2007-02-13T06:14:00.000-08:00

The mobile telephone penetration rate in Hungary is 99% at the end of 2006.

99%!!!

It's still only 54% in Canada....

Mobile Money

2007-02-13T06:01:00.000-08:00

Mastercard Worldwide and the GSM Association, along with a group of many worldwide wireless carriers are working on a test project to allow people to transfer money wirelessly to other countries.

The usual way of sending money to other countries is sometimes unreliable, and this system is proving to be faster and better.

If this test project rolls out, it will generate a new income stream for the wireless carriers.

I hope to hear more of this soon; it's pretty darn cool.

December 2006 Wireless Subscriber Growth

2007-01-22T07:26:00.000-08:00

China Mobile: 4.83 million new users

Russia: 2.73 million new users (total 152 million)

Ukraine: 5.7 millioin new users (total 50 million)

Move Over RAZR; Here Comes iPhone

2007-01-11T12:19:00.000-08:00

Sometimes I think handset makers are so stupid.

They knew the iPhone was coming and they did nothing about it.

Granted, Apple might not even gain more than 1% of the market in 2007. Or will they?

Everyone has known for perhaps up to two years that Apple was coming after the phone market. That's like knowing you're city is going to be invaded and having two years to prepare for it. And what did the handset makers do about it?

They built a few mp3 phones for which you need an expansion card just to bring them up to 1Gb of storage space.

That's like building a moat around your city but leaving the draw-bridge down when your attackers arrive.

I think Sony-Ericsson was the only manufacturer that even made any kind of an effort to get ready to compete with Apple. They came out with phones that are expandable up to 4GB. But they're not anywhere near what the iPhone will be in terms of an all-in-one product.

To the handset manufacturers: Are you really all that stupid?

Why not give people what they want? You could have been first-to-market. You could have beat Apple to the punch. You could have been the first hard drive phone maker. You could have had a two year head-start. You could have wrested away *some* top-of-the-mind-awareness that will go along with the iPhone.

You thought the RAZR was successful? You ain't seen nothing yet.

Wireless MySpace

2006-12-19T06:31:00.000-08:00

Cingular Wireless is going to offer their users access to MySpace.com on their phones for $2.99/month.

Users will be able to post pictures, blog updates and comments.

Facebook has already been mobile for many months via Cingular, Sprint and Verizon.

Good Technology Inc Bought By Motorola

2006-11-14T07:03:00.000-08:00

Good Technology Inc provides the wireless email software solution that the Motorola Q phone happens to use.

Motorola just bought them.

Obviously it's because Moto wants the Q to be a bigger competitor to the Blackberry. Now, I love RIM, but I think this move further positions the Q to become the only viable BB alternative.

YouTube On Your Cell

2006-11-10T07:14:00.000-08:00

Have you ever heard of your cell phone called "The Third Screen"?

The idea is that people are spending less time watching TV and more time on the 2nd screen, their computers, and more & more on the 3rd screen, their cell phones.

That trend will continue to increase if Verizon & YouTube find a way to format their site for phones to watch videos. Their 57 million clients would be sure to add to YouTube's bottom line.

I can already waste hours on the actual site; can you imagine what would happen if you could watch it anywhere?

Subscriber Stats in Singapore

2006-11-08T06:43:00.000-08:00

Singapore Telecommunications Ltd (SingTel) just passed the 100 million mark for subscribers.

Wireless Web Usage by Country

2006-10-26T13:07:00.000-07:00

Here's a few interesting stats about wireless web phone usage penetration:

U.S. usage: 19%
U.K. usage: 24%
France: 28%
Spain: 26%
Italy: 34%
Germany: 34%

Surprising low. I was talking to someone the other day when I pulled out my phone to tell them what the weather would be like the next few days. They were shocked to hear I was online. Can you believe some people have still not heard about it?

Wireless Phone Stats for Russia & Ukraine

2006-10-13T13:30:00.000-07:00

Russia:
New mobile phone subscribers in Russia in Sept 2006: 1.7 million
Total subs: 148 million
Penetration: 101%
Penetration in Moscow: 152%

Ukraine:
New mobile phone subscribers in Sept 2006: 1.6 million
Total subs: 40 million
Penetration: 85%

Screaming Cell Phones

2006-10-12T07:31:00.000-07:00

This isn't really wireless web related, but it's interesting. :)

There's a new service offered in Britain that is aimed at helping high end data users protect their data in the event of their phone being stolen.

If such a phone is stolen, a signal is sent to the unit which makes it SCREAM LIKE A HUMAN. The handset emits this high-pitched scream and can only be stopped by taking off the battery.

Boy, I'd like to see this happen.

Blackberry Pearl 8100 Review

2006-09-12T05:59:00.000-07:00

Ok, this isn't a real/full review, per se.

I haven't got a chance to play with one yet. But here are my first impressions of the Blackberry Pearl 8100.

Yes, you can finally do all those other media things on a Blackberry. You can now take pictures, listen to mp3s, etc.

But months ago people were saying/hoping this would also take on the iPod in terms of media storage. I think there is a HUGE opportunity that all phone manufacturers are missing out on:

Who will be the first to offer a hard-drive phone?

The first person to market with this concept will clean-up big time. So, RIM really missed out here by being another Johnny-Come-Lately..."Me-Too" phone for which you have to buy an expandable memory card...INSTEAD of a first-to-market iPod-like-phone.

Everyone has heard of podcasts...but have you ever heard of nokiacasts, samsungcasts, LGcasts, motocasts? No, you haven't; because it wouldn't make sense to have those kinds of things with a phone that couldn't handle them. I went out and registered http://www.berrycasts.com (go check it out; it's an aggregator site now) thinking I'd be ready early for the flood of people jumping on the next tech bandwagon. But, alas, no.

The Blackberry Pearl 8100 is nice to look at, and it will sell. But it could have been so much more. Let us hope it has a bigger brother coming.

July Mobile Subs for China

2006-08-28T06:32:00.000-07:00

I just wanted to post the latest total mobile phone subscriber number for China.

It is 431 million. Yup. You read right.

Virgin Mobile Starts Sending Fiction by SMS

2006-08-23T07:25:00.000-07:00

Virgin Mobile (U.S.) has started sending a work of fiction, a novel, by text to 10,000 clients.

They will receive one line twice a day. It's a new piece work called "Ghost Town", and is provided by a site called YouthNoise.

Imagine reading "War and Peace" by text message? I wonder how long that would take....?

China Mobile Phone Stats

2006-08-22T06:28:00.000-07:00

In July, China Mobile added 1.06 million subscribers (818,000 GSM and 245,000 CDMA).

Total GSM subs: 101.4 million
Total CDMA subs: 34.8 million

India Mobile Subscriber Stats for July

2006-08-14T07:24:00.000-07:00

Wow. India added 5.3 million wireless subscribers in July 2006, which brings them to a total of 111 million.

Subscriber Numbers Fell in Brazil

2006-07-27T05:54:00.000-07:00

For the first time ever, the number of mobile phone subscribers in Brazil fell.

Brazil is the 5th largest mobile phone market; they had 92.4 million subs, but it fell to 91.7.

I think this is because Brazil was focussed for years on boosting subscribers, by basically giving free phones to anyone & everyone.

Even the most poor people in the country have cell phones, but they can't afford to buy minutes!

Motorola Q Review

2006-07-26T06:20:00.000-07:00

This isn't a "review", per se.

Think of it as a quick report card.

LOOKS: Have you SEEN the Q yet? It's beautiful enough to tempt away several Blackberry clients. Why? It's super thin, sturdy, the screen quality is awesome, and the jog dial "feels" better than a BB.

COOL FACTOR: You can open attachments, including funny email forwards (movies).

EMAIL: My buddy set up his Q along side his Blackberry. I sent a test message. They both buzzed at the exact same time. Surprising.

EASE OF USE: Poor. It's not intuitive. Well, by now, any mongaloid should be able to find their way around any platform, but with the Q, it takes some getting used to.

SALES: I hear they've sold 1.5 million of them in the first 180 days. Pretty good. Motorola wants to sell 10 million in 12 months.

PRICE: Is it $200 U.S. for a 2-year contract? Nice, huh?

June Subs Numbers for India

2006-07-26T06:15:00.000-07:00

In June, 4.8 million new mobile phone subscribers were added in India.

The total is around 106 million now. That makes about 14 phones per 100 people.

New Ringtones That Can't Be Heard By 40 or 50-Somethings

2006-06-20T11:39:00.000-07:00

I don't know where to buy this ringtone or who thought of it, but here's the info:

There are sounds that younger people can hear, but older folks cannot. Someone turned it into a ringtone for teens.

What does it sound like? Some say it's like scraping your nails on a chalkboard. Screech.

Let me ask you this: if you don't want older people (like teachers?) to hear your phone ringing, why not use the vibrate mode?

Ah, but it's still a cool idea. (the noise was originally meant to make teens stop hanging out at convenience stores)

Some Stats

2006-06-12T06:42:00.000-07:00

1) Bharti in India added 1.2million GSM subs in May.

2) Reliance in India added 541,000 CDMA subs in May.

3) DoCoMo (Japan) has 51.5million subs; they added 134k in May.

4) By 2011, there is supposed to be 210million mobile TV subs.

Motorola Q Phone or Moto Q

2006-05-31T06:09:00.000-07:00

Have you heard about Motorola's new "Q" phone?

It is a competitor to the Blackberry; I've played with one and it seems nice, but I wonder how well the email situation will be....

Anyway, Motorola says they expect the sales of this new phone will be as good as they've been with the RAZR.... Think about that....

Consumers drove the RAZR sales. Business will drive Q sales. Are there really that many people out there ready to scoop up a Q instead of a Blackberry or Treo? We shall see.

I can't wait to see some SLVRs and PEBL and now I hear they're coming out with another super-thin phone called the SCPL (the scalpel). If you ask me, Motorola is on the right track to trumping Nokia from the #1 position.

It seems to me that this is the difference in philosophy between Moto & Nokia:

Motorola: "Lets make phones that people want". (example: the RAZR & SLVR)
Nokia: "Let's tell people what kinds of phones people should want and force it on them". (example: 6016i & 2275)

Don't get mad at me.

Netgear Skype Wi-Fi Phone

2006-05-25T13:09:00.000-07:00

Check out this wi-fi Skype phone:

http://www.popsci.com/popsci/whatsnew/
8f8a964c7de3b010vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd.html
(you'll have to copy & paste)

You can make free calls using a wifi connection anywhere in the world.

.mobi or dot-mobi is coming

2006-05-25T12:53:00.000-07:00

Have you been reading some of the hoopla about the new .mobi domains?

It's a domain extension to be used for optimizing web pages for mobile phones. These names just opened up for big companies with trademarked names; only they can register .mobi domains for the next 70 days to slow down "domainers" or "cyber-squatters" from scooping up the good names.

I did a quick search on Google for "register .mobi domain" and found a few sites that you could use to search which names are taken or available. Some of them actually let you "reserve" a name...with no guarantee that you'll get the name.

It costs anywhere between $45 and $70 from what I saw. Again, this is to slow down the "domainers"...or people who invest in domain names and sell them to other investors.

iPods versus MP3 Phones

2006-05-23T11:51:00.000-07:00

Something to consider:

In 2005, 40-50 million iPods were sold.

In 2005, 80 million MP3 phones were sold.

Whoever first offers a hard-drive MP3 phone is really going to clean up, I betcha.

Mobile Growth In India for April

2006-05-16T06:48:00.000-07:00

Last month in India (April 2006), 3.9 million new mobile phones were activated.

The total mobile phones in India are now at 97 million and should be getting very close to 100 million right now.

China Mobile Stats

2006-05-12T10:06:00.000-07:00

Wow.

China Mobile has 260 million subscribers and signs up 4 million new ones each month.

I don't know what the total penetration rate is in China, but some estimates say there will be 580 million total subs by 2010.

MobiTV Via AT&T WiFi

2006-05-12T09:14:00.000-07:00

You read right.

MobiTV is now showing on laptops connected via WiFi provided by AT&T. You can already find their TV content on a lot of cell phones...but now you can watch their 15 channels on your laptop while waiting in an airport or sipping coffee in some coffee shop.

AT&T has 11,000 hotspots, but this service will be available at 7000 of them to start.

Mspot

2006-05-08T08:24:00.000-07:00

Mspot offer content to U.S. carriers in the form of music, radio, and movies on cell phones.

They've recently made the news for signing radio content contracts with CBS and Clear Channel. The latter is working with Motorola to provide 75 stations to its iRadio service. 75 radio stations on your phone? I'm just wondering if this is radio over IP or something...how much is all this stuff going to cost?

Mobile Money

2006-05-05T06:03:00.000-07:00

PayPal Mobile:
Send text message payments to your friends' phones and select retailers. Your payments will come from your balance, your credit card, or your bank account. I signed up for it and won $5. This is a great thing; I can't wait to use it.

TextPayMe:
Almost the same as above. If the receiver isn't signed up for this service, they get a request to sign up to get the money waiting for them.

Obopay:
You need special software on your cellphone for this to work, and not all carriers allow users to use it. The cool thing about this service is that you get a MasterCard-branded debit card that is linked to the account.

Transponder chips in your phone:
This is used in a lot of countries already. You have a transponder built into your phone with money on it. You wave it in front of a pay terminal in a store or vending machine or subway door and it takes your money. I already use something similar to that here in Toronto, called Dexit. I used to carry the chip as a sticker on my phone, but I kept changing phones, so now I use a little card that is meant to be on your key-chain...but I wear it around my neck. I love buying pizza or soda pop with it!!

I love m-commerce.

Mobile Television

2006-05-01T12:06:00.000-07:00

Think of it.

The bored worker on lunch. The train commuter who missed their favorite show last night. The security guard or other night-time worker with nothing to do. Waiting in line-ups. Someone outside the home due to a previous commitment...not realizing they're going to miss their favorite show...but they didn't PVR it or TiVo it.

Enter the mobile TV phone...capable of downloading quick "mobisodes" or watching other live broadcast mainstream tv clips.

Most carriers are in some stage of providing these services, but some analysts say it will be 3-7 years before we see mass adoption.

With the recent announcement that you'll be able to watch clips of "Lost" on your phone, more will follow, until it becomes a way of life. Comments?

Location Based Tracking for Your Family

2006-05-01T09:21:00.000-07:00

I really like the whole location based tracking subject for keeping track of your kids.

Here's a few items of interest:

Sprint Nextel launched "Family Locator" where you can see the location of your family members phones...right on your phone
Wherify Wireless is launching their own phone with a one-touch "find me" button; they've been around for a few years offering little GPS watches & necklaces
SmartWear Technologies uses RFID to track your kids up to 600 feet away; this is more for younger kids...like the ones who run away from you at the mall; the kids wear a wristband, you send an SMS and get a reply telling you where they are.

Neat stuff, huh?

Phone Wallet Keys

2006-04-27T21:24:00.000-07:00

The COO of Sprint Nextel said recently that there are 3 things consumers will return home for if they forgot 1 of them:

They are your keys, wallet, and phone.

The vision of the mobile providers is that they can merge those items into one....so that your phone becomes your wallet and your keys.

Now, after years of hearing about m-commerce, some countries have already turned the cellphone into a wallet. And there are some people who can open their doors by dialing a number.

Now, what's taking North America so long?

Quick Comment on Wireless Web Stuff in 2006

2006-04-25T19:22:00.000-07:00

Hey there.

My 2 cents on the wireless web in 2006:

Anyone try downloading an mp3 on the LG8100 EVDO phone yet? They complete in about 15 seconds and start playing after about 7 seconds. That's faster than at home. I think we're going to see a lot more fast phones like this really catch on.
MobiTV: with EVDO, etc. mobile TV is going to get way fast. Later this year we should see more "mobisodes"...or shows made just for phones...pop up.
Downloading movies: we'll just touch the iceberg this year
M-commerce: this year we should start to see some more retail payments made with cell phones.

Shawn