Wireless Industry Group Toots Own Horn
The 3G Americas organization, which is composed of carriers using the GSM wireless standard and its successors, offered up a breathless press release we just had to share. The best thing about it is that most potential readers will have no idea what they are talking about, while those that do understand will automatically know how silly the claims are. It is almost as though they released the news so they could have something to high-five over.
With subscriber results in from Informa Telecoms and Media’s World Cellular Information Service for 1Q 2006, 3G Americas reports today that cell phone users across the globe choose GSM 10 to 1 over any other wireless mobile technology. The customer base for the GSM family of technologies – GSM, GPRS, EDGE and UMTS/HSDPA – grew by nearly 120 million additional subscribers in 1Q 2006 alone, compared to the total net growth of CDMA (including CDMA 20001x and EV-DO) of about 12 million customers. Today, the 1.85 billion users of the GSM family of technologies make up more than 81% of the wireless mobile market worldwide, with total subscribers of CDMA at less than 300 million and a 13% market share. There were 57 million customers using UMTS services at the close of 1Q 2006.
So let’s deconstruct. Cel phone users across the globe “chose” the GSM standard, which in most countries was mandated by government, with no competitive choices allowed. The customer base for the GSM family, as counted, includes those under the UMTS/HSDPA technology. UMTS is a variant of CDMA (but conveniently not counted as CDMA market share) that exists because it is a) better and b) different enough from plain-jane CDMA that these industry types could save face by not calling it CDMA. Ask Qualcomm how their CDMA royaltys are affected by UMTS adoption and you can get the picture. Nearly all of the growth in GSM subscribers are really CDMA subscribers in disguise.
Whatever turns them on, I guess.
Source: 3G Americas:Unifying the Americas through Wireless Technology
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