FALLS CHURCH, Va.-GSM technology in the U.S. doubled in both subscribers and handset shipments during 2002, according to research from Telecom Trends International.
The TTI report also found the U.S. wireless market grew 11 percent in subscriber numbers, though overall handset growth was flat for the year. The year’s total 142 million wireless subscribers included 25.3 million GSM subscribers, almost doubling the 12.3 million GSM users reported in 2001. Meanwhile, AMPS and TDMA subscriber numbers decreased. Shipments of AMPS and TDMA handsets also declined to 1.2 million and 11.2 million respectively, while CDMA handset shipments increased to 31.7 million.
“These developments are pretty spectacular,” said William Wallace, a TTI analyst. “They represent some fundamental shifts in the marketplace stemming from the embrace of GSM by two major TDMA carriers, Cingular Wireless and AT&T Wireless.”
