AC&M Says Russia's Mobile User Base Up to 129.64 Mln on Feb 28
MOSCOW, Mar 16 (Prime-Tass) -- The number of mobile phone service subscribers in Russia increased to 129.64 million people (valid SIM cards) as of February 28 from 128.175 million people as of January 31, Advanced Communications & Media (AC&M) said in a report released Thursday.
The penetration of mobile services in the country rose to 89.3% as of February 28 from 88.3% as of January 31, AC&M said.
Russia?s population amounted to 142.7 million people as of January 1, according to the Federal State Statistics Service.
Some analysts consider the figures provided by AC&M to be inflated, as many people in Russia use several SIM cards.
Russia?s mobile penetration rate amounted to about 60% in January, up from about 56% in December 2005, according to survey results of ROMIR Monitoring.
The subscriber base in the Moscow Licensed Area (MLA) rose to 23.201 million people as of February 28 from 23.019 million people as of January 31. Penetration was at 136.6% in February, compared with 135.5% in January. MegaFon accounted for 69.6% of the net additions in Moscow in February, VimpelCom for 20.4%, MTS for 8.4% and Sky Link for 1.6%.
As of February 28, MTS had a 43.9% share of the total subscriber base in the MLA, VimpelCom had a 40.7% share, while MegaFon and Sky Link had 14.8% and 0.6%, respectively.
The subscriber base in St. Petersburg rose to 7.663 million people from 7.595 million people as of January 31. Penetration rose to 120.9% in February from 119.8% in January.
MTS accounted for 35.1% of Russia's total subscriber base in February, VimpelCom had a 34.0% share and MegaFon 18.2%.
MTS and VimpelCom accounted for 38.7% and 24.8% of the increase in Russia's total subscriber base in February respectively, while MegaFon accounted for 25.4%.
End"
Posted to the site on 16th March 2006
