Asia Pacific is undoubtedly the hub for wireless services growth with the region accounting for 2.1 billion of the global connections at 45% growth. The main contributors to this growth are China and India.

In the fourth quarter of 2009, Asia Pacific region accounted for 62% of the total new connections added for wireless services across the globe. India alone saw 53.4 million subscribers added. China too saw an average of 9 million subscribers added on a monthly scale in the quarter.

On a global scale, the yearly rise was 16% while on sequential comparison the growth is seen at 4%. The share of GSM technology in the overall subscriber base in the region is at 80%. WCDMA and CDMA subscribers contribute 10% each. 73% of the subscribers added were prepaid while 27% were postpaid. 69% of the population now owns a mobile connection. The global mobile services subscriber base at the end of Q4 2009 reached 4.7 billion.

30 new mobile service providers launched their service in the quarter including world’s first two LTE-based commercial networks. "2009 was a positive year for the mobile telecoms industry and one that saw it outperform global economic trends," commented Joss Gillet, senior analyst at Wireless Intelligence.

"Nonetheless, the fact that developing countries account for half of the world''s connections today demonstrates how mature markets are reaching capacity. From Europe to the Americas, the prospects for the year ahead depend on how quickly mobile operators can boost revenues generated by data services. By contrast, in regions such as Africa and the Asia-Pacific, many price-sensitive markets require investment to expand 2G and 3G networks, which have been delayed by the global recession. In such a challenging competitive environment, time-to-market is more critical than ever to sustain growth and differentiate from competition,” he added.

In Western Europe there are some markets which are witnessing negative growth i.e. subscriber surrendering the service. However the trend in the region is now titled in favour of mobile data services.