Mobile penetration in the Middle East varies enormously from country to country

Research and Markets have announced the addition of the 'Middle East Mobile Communications 2004 report to their offering.

(PRWEB) June 16, 2004 -- Mobile penetration in the region varies enormously from country to country. The variations can partly be explained by differences in wealth and economic development and market competition but not entirely. Government policy is also a major factor. In Lebanon the Government specifically limited the maximum number of subscribers of the operators of two BOT contracts who established services in the mid-1990s. These BOT contracts were terminated in June 2001 and since then disputes with the operators, failed attempts to sell licences and failure within the government to agree on policy have stalled the market.

Iran, Syria, Iraq and Yemen have dramatically low numbers of mobile subscribers. In the case of Yemen low economic development is the main cause but numbers are growing. Iraq had no mobile service before the second Gulf War in 2003. Three licences were awarded in late 2003 and all three operators have launched services. Subscriber numbers are now expected to grow quickly. Services in Iran have been limited by infrastructure capacity problems and again subscriber numbers could grow quickly once the Irancell consortium led by Turkcell, the winner of a recent licence tender, starts operations. There are no major market structure changes under-way in Syria but the introduction of prepaid services in 2004 may lead to growth

Counties covered: Afghanistan, Bahrain, Egypt Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey United Arab Emirates, Yemen

Report also contains: GSM, CDMA, 3G, SMS, Edge, WAP, GPRS, Mobile data, m-commerce, Fixed-mobile substitution, WLL, telemetry, Bluetooth, Paging, PMR, Mobile satellite, GPS, location services. Report contains industry issues and strategies, government policies, spectrum developments.

Technology information
Global overview
Trends and Developments
Business Strategies
User statistics
Revenues and forecasts

For a complete index of this report click on http://www.researchandmarkets.com/reports/75112

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