By Tim Ferguson
Thursday, November 30 2006 11:37 AM
URL: http://www.zdnetasia.com/news/communications/0,39044192,61970998,00.htm

Nokia is predicting there will be more than four billion mobile phone subscriptions globally by 2010.

The Finnish company suggests the main driver behind this growth will be the increasingly mobile nature of the Internet, with many people in developing markets accessing the Internet for the first time through mobile phones.

Speaking at the Nokia World 2006 conference in Amsterdam today, Nokia CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo said: "Mobile communications is once again changing even faster than many of us have predicted, and we are still far away from this being a mature market."

"The next wave of the internet will be to make it truly mobile, creating new ways for people to connect to others and find information from wherever they are," he added.

Music downloads, mobile TV and satellite navigation services will all contribute to the growth of mobile subscriptions, Kallasvuo predicted.

Nokia expects the emerging markets of India and China to contribute more than half of the world's mobile subscriptions growth over the next four years.

The company also expects the mobile handset replacement market to make up 65 percent of the global market in 2006--and to rise to 80 percent by 2010.

Tim Ferguson of Silicon.com reported from London.