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India to overtake china as world's largest cell market
By agencies
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Monday, 13 February 2006, 20:30 IST
MUMBAI: After catching up with China in mobile subscriber growth in December '05, India is all set to surpass the neighbor to become the world's fastest growing cellular market.
India will add a whopping 358 million mobile subscribers between '06 and '11, says Portio Researchs study on Top 25 Mobile Growth Markets Worldwide.
China, the largest mobile market now, will add 354 million users during the period, becoming the second fastest growing market. In 06, we expect to see the Asia Pacific region break the magic 1 billion subscribers mark, the Middle East should cross over 50 million and Europe pass a total of 700 million subscribers across the entire region, the study said.
A substantial part of the forecast subscriber growth from the beginning of 06 to end-11 will be witnessed in the Asia Pacific region, with vast growth opportunities in China, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Thailand, Indonesia, Vietnam and the Philippines. By 11, we estimate that the Asia Pacific region will account for approximately 50 percent of the worlds entire mobile subscriber base, with a staggering 1.067 billion subscribers between China and India alone, the worlds two biggest mobile markets, said the study.
China has been adding about 4-5 million mobile users per month. India achieved this landmark in December 05 when the mobile subscribers addition reached around 4.5 million in a single month for the first time since the launch of mobile service in the year 1995, according to telecom regulator TRAI. Thus, India has really caught up with China in mobile growth, TRAI said.
China began mobile services in 1988. If the first eleven years of performance is considered, the performance of the Indian mobile sector appears to be better than Chinas, according to the regulator.