The Communications Act requires the submission to Congress each year of reports analyzing the state of competition in the mobile wireless industry.
The Seventeenth Mobile Wireless Competition Report was released in December 2014. This report covered data from 2013 and the first half of 2014 and looked at factors such as market shares among providers, coverage, and pricing trends. When we released the Seventeenth Mobile Wireless Competition Report, we noted that we would update many of the charts and tables in that report when new data became available.
Today, we are updating many of those charts and tables based on recently collected data relevant to competition in the mobile wireless industry. For example, we are providing information on total wireless connections by service segment; overall mobile voice and mobile broadband coverage; and provider-specific coverage. And, we have also added user-friendly interactive coverage maps. This mid-year update reflects our newly focused efforts to capture important details in the evolving mobile wireless marketplace.
Among other things, the updated information shows:
- Total wireless connections increased by 23.5 million from 2013 to 2014, with 14.7 million connections added between the 2nd and 4th quarter of 2014;
- The post-paid market continues to show noteworthy growth with 3.9 million connections added in the 4th quarter 2014; and
- Quarterly net adds for connected devices almost doubled between the 4th quarter 2013 and 4th quarter 2014.
We are also releasing a Public Notice seeking input as we prepare the Eighteenth Mobile Wireless Competition Report. The Public Notice, about half as long as the previous report’s PN, reflects a more streamlined approach to seeking such input. Specifically, the Public Notice seeks public input to update the information and metrics used in the Seventeenth Annual Mobile Wireless Competition Report.
Please visit the Mobile Wireless Competition Report website to see the updated data. We encourage all interested stakeholders to respond to the Eighteenth Mobile Wireless Competition Report PN to let us know how we can enhance our analysis of competition in the mobile wireless marketplace.