Competition in Wireless: Spectrum, Service and Technology Wars

Mark Jamison, University of Florida, Len Waverman, London Business School, and Niall Levine, University of Strathclyde

12/15/2008
(Original Publish Date: 3/7/2003)

It is by now well understood that wireless is becoming the dominant mode for voice telecommunications worldwide. According to the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), the number of mobile phones was to exceed the number of fixed line phones by 2003 (ITU, 2000). This pattern first emerged in Cambodia in 1993 and by the year 2000 it was also true for thirteen developed countries and twenty-two developing countries. (ITU, 2002) It appears that even in the United States (US) long the holdout developed country for significant mobile telephone growth because of its high fixed line penetration the conventional wisdom is that the number of fixed line phones is declining as customers drop their fixed line service for mobile service.