U.S. Leads In Mobile Data

It was reported last week that China now has over 1 billion mobile users. India is up and coming with over 20 million mobile users. However, no one can beat the over consumption of data like the U.S.  According to Chetan Sharma, who is a member of the GigaOM Pro Analyst Network, he says U.S. companies are showing strong growth both in terms of overall traffic and revenue. This overhaul of the data market is largely in part of flat-rate services, 3G, and mobile devices such as iPhone and Blackberry.

Here are some of Chetan Sharma's findings for the first half of 2009:

• Mobile data now accounts for 25 percent of total global service revenue.
• Verizon is the second-largest carrier in terms of mobile data, edging past China Mobile and closing in on NTT DoCoMo, which had revenues of $8 billion.
• U.S. data revenues were $20.6 billion vs. $16 billion for Japan and $8.6 billion for China during the first six months of this year.
• Top 10 global wireless carriers now account for 63 percent of global mobile data revenue.
• Biggest mobile growth was registered by Verizon, AT&T and Softbank. Two out of those three companies sell iPhones.
• Data revenue for the overall industry was up 10 percent from the second half of 2008, showing that the current craze for smartphones is helping to boost mobile Internet usage.