Research and Markets: 2008 Western European Mobile Communications and Mobile Data Statistics (tables only)

DUBLIN, Ireland--(Business Wire)--
Research and Markets
(http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/00483d/2008_western_europ) has
announced the addition of the "2008 Western European Mobile Communications and
Mobile Data Statistics (tables only)" report to their offering.

This report provides 521 statistical tables for the mobile communications and
mobile data activities, both on a regional and national level, for the major 18
Western European countries.

Most of Europe's mobile markets are saturated, only three countries in 2008
having less than 110% penetration. Continuing growth is largely in the 3G sector
as subscribers migrate from GSM networks. Operators have encouraged this
migration in a bid to exploit the potential raised by their investments in HSPA
technology. Although the proportion of data to overall revenue has increased for
most network operators, mobile data use remains stubbornly low as subscribers
remain skeptical of the usefulness of many data applications as well as their
high cost.

Average mobile penetration across Europe reached about 120% by June 2008 while
sustaining subscriber growth of about 8%. The value of Europe's mobile market
has shown consistent growth for several years, growing by about 4% in 2007,
reaching between euro135 and euro145 billion, compared with 4.6% in 2006 and 6%
in 2005. This slowdown in revenue growth was largely due to intensifying
competition and regulatory action which led to falling prices for voice minutes,
roaming and interconnection charges.

Growth in coming years will primarily depend on subscribers using rich-media
services including music downloads and mobile TV. The 3G subscriber base on
which mobile data growth depends has increased by 40-70% in some markets, while
the proportion of non-SMS data to overall revenue among network operators has
grown consistently during the last few quarters. Nevertheless, providers have
struggled to encourage subscribers to use services which are perceived as
expensive and of uncertain value.

The 3G market in Europe has a far more positive outlook in 2009, given the
migration of 2G users to 3G and the greater number of 3G net adds. However, the
considerable growth in the number of subscribers has not yet translated into
significantly higher revenue for operators. Much of this has been due to
operator preference for charging for data used rather than the single payment
all-inclusive model preferred by many customers, though unlimited data use for a
fixed fee as well as more generous data caps has been introduced and will become
common practice. Take-up of 3G has also followed the greater reliability of
handsets and a better awareness of 3G capabilities among subscribers.

The following notes provide some background to our scenario forecasting
methodology:

* This report includes what we term scenario forecasts. By describing long-range
scenarios we identify a band within which we expect market growth to occur. The
associated text describes what we see as the most likely growth trend within
this band.
* The projections shown in the tables in this report are based on our own
historical information, as well as on telecommunication sector statistics from
official and non-official, national and international sources. We assume a
possible deviation of 15-20% around this data.
* All statistics for GDP, revenue, etc are shown in US$, in order to maintain
consistency within and between markets. At the same time we acknowledge that
this can introduce some irregularities.

Countries Covered:

* Austria
* Belgium
* Denmark
* Finland
* France
* Germany
* Iceland
* Ireland
* Italy
* Luxembourg
* Malta
* Netherlands
* Norway
* Portugal
* Spain
* Sweden
* Switzerland
* United Kingdom

For more information visit
http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/00483d/2008_western_europ

Laura Wood
Senior Manager
press@researchandmarkets.com
Fax from USA: 646-607-1907
Fax from rest of the world: +353-1-481-1716

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