{"id":15639,"date":"2024-02-23T11:35:14","date_gmt":"2024-02-23T11:35:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gsma.com\/solutions-and-impact\/connectivity-for-good\/public-policy\/?page_id=15639"},"modified":"2025-10-15T15:27:58","modified_gmt":"2025-10-15T14:27:58","slug":"mobile-for-development","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/solutions-and-impact\/connectivity-for-good\/public-policy\/mobile-policy-handbook\/mobile-for-development\/","title":{"rendered":"Appendix: connecting the world through mobile"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Business environment<\/p>\n \n

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The evolution of spectrum<\/p>\n \n

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Consumer protection<\/p>\n \n

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Environmental sustainability<\/p>\n \n

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Appendix: connecting the world through mobile<\/h1>\n

By the end of 2024, 58% of the world\u2019s population used mobile internet, equating to 4.7 billion users \u2013 an increase of 2.2 billion since 2015. More than 90% of those still not using mobile internet already live in areas with coverage but face other barriers to adoption. Looking ahead, mobile internet penetration is projected to increase to 5.5 billion by 2030, encompassing 64% of the global population.<\/p>\n

About 40% of new mobile internet subscribers between 2025 and 2030 are expected to come from Asia Pacific, driven by growth in India, Pakistan and Indonesia. In the same period,<\/p>\n

Sub-Saharan Africa is expected to account for nearly a quarter of new mobile internet subscribers, while Latin America and the Middle East and North Africa are each anticipated to contribute just over 10%.<\/p>\n

Over the next few years, subscribers will continue transitioning to newer network generations. By the end of 2024, 5G accounted for more than half of mobile connections in North America, Greater China and developed Asia Pacific. Growth will intensify in the second half of this decade, with 5G adoption set to exceed 80% in leading 5G markets by 2030. It is still early days for 5G adoption in most emerging 5G markets. However, 5G adoption will gather pace over the next few years with the arrival of cheaper 5G smartphones and new spectrum assignments.<\/p>\n

The challenge for the mobile industry will be translating 5G adoption into meaningful revenue growth. Shifting investment to more advanced forms of 5G, particularly 5G networks based on the Standalone (SA) architecture, as well as 5G-Advanced, will be important to unlock new use cases and monetisation opportunities. However, this investment will not occur automatically, and issues that limit the mobile sector\u2019s capacity to invest will need to be addressed first.<\/p>\n

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Appendix: connecting the world through mobile By the end of 2024, 58% of the world\u2019s population used mobile internet, equating to 4.7 billion users \u2013 an increase of 2.2 billion since 2015. More than 90% of those still not using mobile internet already live in areas with coverage but face other barriers to adoption. Looking […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_oasis_is_in_workflow":0,"_oasis_original":0,"_oasis_task_priority":"","footnotes":""},"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/solutions-and-impact\/connectivity-for-good\/public-policy\/mobile-policy-handbook\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/15639"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/solutions-and-impact\/connectivity-for-good\/public-policy\/mobile-policy-handbook\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/solutions-and-impact\/connectivity-for-good\/public-policy\/mobile-policy-handbook\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/solutions-and-impact\/connectivity-for-good\/public-policy\/mobile-policy-handbook\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/solutions-and-impact\/connectivity-for-good\/public-policy\/mobile-policy-handbook\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15639"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/solutions-and-impact\/connectivity-for-good\/public-policy\/mobile-policy-handbook\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/15639\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22202,"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/solutions-and-impact\/connectivity-for-good\/public-policy\/mobile-policy-handbook\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/15639\/revisions\/22202"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/solutions-and-impact\/connectivity-for-good\/public-policy\/mobile-policy-handbook\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15639"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/solutions-and-impact\/connectivity-for-good\/public-policy\/mobile-policy-handbook\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15639"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}