February 18, 2004: GSM continues to show outstanding progress by providing state-of-the-art wireless service to an expanding customer base in established markets, while introducing the world's most successful digital technology to entirely new ones.

GSM made excellent ground in 2003, adding a total of over 198 million new subscribers to reach almost 990 million customers worldwide according to market data from EMC. This accounts for a 71% share of the total subscriptions with over 500 operators in over 190 countries. GSM grew by a monthly average of 16.5 million new subscribers, outperforming the market and underlining GSM's position as the global service and standard for mobile communications. By the end of 2003 there were also 2.8 million WCDMA subscribers and 13 networks were offering commercial services, in addition to 15 networks in pre-commercial phase.

At the same time, strong industry take-up of EDGE extended to all regions of the world as most GSM operators came to appreciate the complementary attributes of GSM/EDGE and WCDMA as the most efficient and flexible approach to 3G.

Customer growth in GSM in the year to December 2003 was 80% of net subscriber additions. The strongest growth in subscriber numbers was in Asia Pacific, while China maintained its position as the world's largest mobile market. Most operators of TDMA and CDMA networks committed to implementing GSM/GPRS overlays, primarily in the Americas where GSM is growing strongly, just having passed 20 million subscribers landmark in total in Latin and Central America by year end. Globally, one billion subscribers are expected to be using GSM just now, early 2004.

Unstoppable growth for GSM

"The growth of GSM over the past years continues to be spectacular," says Alan Hadden, President of the Global mobile Suppliers Association. Handset sales growth was impressive especially in the second half, with dozens of new models coming on to the market packed with exciting user and revenue-driving features."

There were 246 million new digital subscribers added in 2003, which took the global total of mobile phone users to 1.38 billion by end of 2003. Of these new subscribers 80.5%, or 198 million, selected GSM.

"The number of new GSM subscribers in 2003 alone, 198 million, is greater than the entire cumulative subscriber base of the next biggest digital standard," continues Alan Hadden. "These figures again clearly prove that GSM is THE global wireless technology."

Asia Pacific is the region that experienced the most growth also in 2003, adding 82.4 million GSM subscribers. In addition, Latin America and Eastern Europe were the other two regions where GSM was the only technology to increase its regional market share. Also in the US, GSM developed favourably: GSM subscribers in the USA and Canada increased by 77%.

Western Europe added 32 million new GSM subscribers, and in Eastern Europe GSM subscribers increased by over 34 million, continuing an amazing growth by 45% year-on-year. Especially Russia contributed to the growth by over 17 million new subscribers during 2003.

"The market is poised for 3G take-off from early 2004," concludes Alan Hadden. "Operators are investing significantly now in quality and capacity for their GSM networks to support voice and enhanced data services, enabled by WCDMA and EDGE. The pace of introduction of advanced mobile multimedia services, and revenue growth, is expected to accelerate from now on."

Source of subscriber data: EMC

About GSA

GSA, the Global mobile Suppliers Association, is the forum for, and represents, the leading GSM/3G suppliers world-wide www.gsacom.com

- Media Resources
- February 2004 Global Mobile Dialogue™ Newsletter
- GSA Annual Report 2003
- Media Enquiries

GSA at the 3GSM World Congress: www.gsacom.com/cannes

GSA artwork available at www.gsacom.com/artwork/

Further information about the GSA

Press Archive