This morning at the CTIA wireless event in Las Vegas, CTIA President Steve Largent announced the latest metrics for mobile phone usage in the U.S. The numbers only reaffirm the mobile platform as the best one for interactive health applications. Here’s a quick rundown of the latest wireless stats for U.S. subscribers:
Subscribers: The total number of subscribers at the end of 2008 was more than 270 million, which is 15 million more than year-end 2007.
Minutes: During 2008 U.S. wireless subscribers used 2.2 trillion minutes talking on the phone, an average of 26 minutes a day per subscriber.
Text Messages: Some 1 trillion text messages were sent and received during 2008, triple the number of texts in 2007. Interestingly, 620 billion texts were sent during the second half of 2008.
Revenues: Total wireless revenues in 2008 came to $148 billion, which is $9 billion more than 2007.
So next time you hear someone throw cold water on the prospect of using text messages for appointment reminders or adherence and compliance, let them know 1 trillion text messages were exchanged in the U.S. last year.