GSM is 20 today

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The global system for mobile communications, or GSM as we have come to know and love it, celebrates its 20th birthday today.

On 7 September 1987, some 15 telecommunications players from 13 countries joined forces to sign a memorandum of understanding that resulted in the development of the first Europe-wide digital cellular system.

This initial foundation then evolved into what became the world's first global mobile system and has led to an industry that today has 2.5 billion users and growing.

The agreement to work together signed in Copenhagen two decades ago put the wheels of the current mobile revolution in motion and users' demand for the innovation shows no sign of subsiding. Indeed today, GSM technologies account for 85 per cent of the worldwide mobile services market and, each year, users buy more than one billion new handsets, chat to people for the more than seven trillion minutes and send around 2.5 trillion texts, according to the GSM Association (GSMA) and other industry sources including the analyst Gartner, Informa and Wireless Intelligence.

"The 1987 agreement is widely regarded as the foundation of today's global mobile phone industry and the birth of one of the greatest technological achievements of our age," said Rob Conway, chief executive of the GSMA.

"The early vision of our industry created international cooperation on an unprecedented scale that has led to a socio-economic revolution benefiting people, businesses and countries throughout the world."

Sir Christopher Gent, former Vodaone chief executive and one of the memorandum's original signatories, added: "GSM is the single most important agreement in the history of telecommunications. With 2.5 billion users around the world today, it has done more to bridge the digital divide than any other innovation, and is a tremendous example of global cooperation."

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