2003: The figures that counted

This is the second post for Textually 2003 - The Year in Review, a series of entries rounding up the most interesting mobile news (best and worst) reported this year.

2003: The Figures that Counted

This year, the cell phone turned 30, as on the 3rd of April 1973, Dr Martin Cooper made the first cell phone call in a demonstration outside a Hilton Hotel in New York, that became the first step towards a massive change in the way we communicate. 2003 has been an amazing year of growth for cell phones, spurred by the success and demand for camera phones. Handset sales are expected to reach half a billion units this year and in some parts of the world mobile phones surpass fixed lines. Stunning everyone, studies report that camera phones are expected to outsell digital still cameras this year and that ringtones sales will soon outstrip sales of CD singles. But beyond business, per a report published today by the ITU, the rapid spread of mobile communications in developing countries has had a major impact in bridging the digital divide.

-- 492 million cell phones are expected to be sold worldwide in 2003.

-- Global sales of cameraphones surpassed sales of conventional digital cameras in the first half of 2003, a milestone in the mobile-phone industry. By year end 2003, camera phones are expected to outsell digital still cameras, 57 million to 44 million.

-- Europeans will send over 113 billion text messages, this year.

-- There are now more mobile phone users than there are landline phones in China. The country now has 259.638 million cell phones compared to 255.139 million landlines.

-- One out of three SMS sent in the world is is in Chinese.

-- There are 53 million cell phones in Italian for 58 million inhabitants, a penetration rate of 93 percent, which makes it the third-highest in the world, and compares with 49 percent in the United States and 62 percent in Japan.

-- In Japan, 96 percent of the phones for sale include a camera. In the US, no more than half of the cell phones include a camera phone.

-- Worldwide, camera phones account for just an estimated 8 percent of cellular phone sales.

-- Ring tones, a service that didn't exist five years ago, now account for $50 million in annual revenue according to the Yankee Group or $2 billion in revenue, according to Consulting firm Strategy Analytics.

-- Sales of ringtones are set to rise dramatically this year, and will soon outstrip those of CD singles, according to the Mobile Data Association (MDA).

-- The Mobile Data Association predict $ 120.7 million worth of ringtones will be sold in 2003, up from $ 69 million in 2002. Zelos Group claims sales of ring tones will top $1.5 billion worldwide in 2003, and nearly $100 million in the United States..

For more 2003 facts and figures, click on the Random Stats categories in Textually.org, Picturephoning.com and Ringtonia.com.

emily | 9:59 AM | Textually 2003 - The Year in Review |
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