Mobile web usage grows as text boom continues

News
By Maggie Holland
published

New figures from the Mobile Data Association show that data usage is continuing to drive growth, particularly SMS, MMS and mobile internet browsing.

Users' hunger for mobile data consumption shows no signs of abating, with figures published today by the Mobile Data Association text and picture messaging and browsing the web on the move are all growing massively in popularity.

During 2007, SMS volumes grew by 40 per cent year-on-year, helping the total to exceed 59 billion, with MMS also gaining momentum to surpass 448 million, according to the MDA's first quarterly 'state of the nation' report.

December was also a particularly buoyant month, as is usually the case due to a seasonal spike in activity, with almost 5,000 texts sent per second and more than 290 million messages sent on New Year's Eve - 30 per cent up on that day in 2006.

The number of mobile internet users is also enjoying someone of a growth spurt. In 2007, its total user base shot up from just over 16 million to 17.58 million last - equating to almost a quarter (23 per cent) of overall mobile users in the UK.

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Maggie Holland
Maggie Holland

Maggie has been a journalist since 1999, starting her career as an editorial assistant on then-weekly magazine Computing, before working her way up to senior reporter level. In 2006, just weeks before ITPro was launched, Maggie joined Dennis Publishing as a reporter. Having worked her way up to editor of ITPro, she was appointed group editor of CloudPro and ITPro in April 2012. She became the editorial director and took responsibility for ChannelPro, in 2016.

Her areas of particular interest, aside from cloud, include management and C-level issues, the business value of technology, green and environmental issues and careers to name but a few.