Canadians Now Sending 3.4 Million Text Messages Per Day

Canadians sent more than 710 million person-to-person text messages from their mobile phones in 2004, up from 352 million the previous year and 300 per cent more than the 174 million in 2002. The Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association (CWTA) also announced that text messaging volumes reached 95.5 million, or more than 3.4 million per day, for the month of February 2005.

"After a year that saw the addition of 1.5 million new wireless subscribers, including a stellar fourth quarter of more than 660,000 additions, Canadian wireless phone customers now number more than 15 million," said Peter Barnes, CWTA President and CEO. "And the phenomenal uptake of text messaging over the past three years is another clear example that Canadians' affection for all things wireless continues to grow."

In the first North American initiative of its kind, Canada introduced inter-carrier text messaging in the spring of 2002. This allowed customers of Canada's wireless carriers to send SMS text messages by simply addressing their message to a recipient's wireless phone number, regardless of the recipient's service provider. This was followed less than a year later with the introduction of cross-border inter-carrier text messaging that allowed Canadians to text message with friends and colleagues in the United States."

Posted to the site on 23rd March 2005