In the world there are more Sims than people: they are over 8.2 billion and they dominate, also driven by the pandemic, mobile broadband subscriptions, i.e. broadband subscriptions that allow you to use apps and online services on the move; meanwhile, those with 5G connection have reached 660 million worldwide.
These are up-to-date data from Ericsson’s Mobility Report, released a few days before the start of the Mobile World Congressthe largest mobile phone fair, held every year in Barcelona and this year returns from February 28: “It is now a fact that the Sims in circulation exceed the world human population, with a penetration rate equal to 104% “, explained by Ericsson, commenting on the data relating to the whole of 2021. Which closed with approximately 8.2 billion Sim, an acronym for Subscriber Identity Modulei.e. Subscriber Identification Card.
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In the fourth quarter of 2021 alone, mobile network subscriptions grew by 24 million units: the largest quarterly contribution comes from China (+5 million), followed by the United States (+4 million) and Pakistan (+3 million). The report also photographs the continued growth in the use of the Internet from mobile devices, an increase also driven by the coronavirus: in the fourth quarter of 2021, the number of mobile broadband subscriptions increased by about 80 million, for a total of almost 6 , 9 billion, an increase of 6% year-over-year (today 85% of mobile subscriptions are broadband).
The growth of mobile broadband subscriptions and the increasing consumption of video also leads to an increase in mobile data traffic, which is grew by 44% between the fourth quarter of 2020 and the same period of 2021to reach 80 exabytes: it is an enormous amount of data, which is equivalent to what would be generated by streaming 24 hours a day, for an entire month, made by all the inhabitants of Italy and Spain together with a video in Full HD quality .
From a point of view of the technology used for access the Internet on the go, there is a growth in LTE subscriptions, a connection standard that allows access to broadband even on mobile networks: in the last quarter of 2021 they increased by about 37 million, reaching a total of 4.7 billion, or 57% of the total. In the same period, 5G subscriptions grew by 98 million to 660 million worldwide.
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Also according to the Ericsson Mobility Report, 200 operators have created services with fifth generation networks and at least 20 have implemented the so-called stand-alone 5G networks, i.e. completely autonomous; in short, 5G “is on track to become the dominant mobile technology by 2027″.