Thursday, December 19, 2019

Perhaps 17% of U.S. Customers Still Use 3G

Mobile operators launch a new next-generation network about every decade, and therefore eventually must decommission older networks. That has happened globally at least once, when the analog network was shuttered.

In some markets 2G networks are closed, or will be over the next few years. We also now are reaching the point where 3G will be shut down. 

Since 4G arrived roughly a decade ago, it has been clear that both 2G and 3G networks eventually would be turned off. Here is an estimate of the expiration dates on some of those networks in Europe. Very soon, there will be less 2G or 3G left in Europe. 

Country
Operator
2G/3G sunset date
Norway
Telia Norge AS
Final 3G shutdown 2021, phasing out starts in 2019
Norway
Telenor Norge AS
2G shutdown 2025, 3G shutdown 2020
Sweden
Three
3G shutdown 2020
Sweden
Telenor Sverige AB
3G shutdown 2020
Sweden
Tele2 AB
3G shutdown 2025
Sweden
Telia Company AB
3G shutdown 2025
Denmark
Three
3G shutdown 2020
Netherlands
KPN B.V.
3G shutdown Jan 2022
Germany
Vodafone GmbH
2G shutdown 2025, 3G shutdown 2020
Austria
Three
3G shutdown 2020
Liechtenstein
Telecom Liechtenstein AG
2G shutdown Jan 2021
Switzerland
Swisscom Ltd
2G shutdown 31.12.2020
Switzerland
Sunrise Communications AG
2G shutdown 31.12.2021
Switzerland
Salt
2G shutdown 31.12.2020
United Kingdom
EE Limited
3G shutdown 2022
United Kingdom
Three
3G shutdown 2020
United Kingdom
BT
3G shutdown 2021
Ireland
Three
3G shutdown 2020
France
Orange
3G shutdown 2021
Italy
Vodafone Italia S.p.A
2G shutdown 2025, 3G shutdown 2020
Italy
Three
3G shutdown 2020


It never is pain free, as some customers stubbornly prefer older networks, and must either be migrated to more-modern networks or lost. The GSMA says 17 percent of U.S. subscribers, and 19 percent of U.S. mobile connections were used 3G at the end of 2018.

Opensignal says there are three main reasons some users continue to prefer 3G networks.

Opensignal says 83.2 percent of 3G-only users in the United States do not buy a 4G rate plan. 

Some 12.7 percent of 3G-only users spent time exclusively in areas where 4G does not reach, and just 4.1 percent of 3G-only users lack a 4G-capable smartphone. 
 

Convincing the few remaining customers on legacy networks to migrate never is completely painless, but has been done before, so mobile operators know what to do.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Is Sora an "iPhone Moment?"

Sora is OpenAI’s new cutting-edge and possibly disruptive AI model that can generate realistic videos based on textual descriptions.  Perhap...