The Global Mobile Suppliers Association (GSA) today published its latest GSM/3G Market Update. Amongst the issues reported this month, GSA has confirmed that 300 WCDMA networks have been commercially launched in 126 countries. WCDMA has achieved approaching 75% market share of commercial 3G networks with an estimated 410+ million subscriptions.

GSA says that 95% of WCDMA networks have enabled HSPA, with HSPA mobile broadband services now commercially available on 283 networks in 119 countries. There are an estimated 150+ million HSPA subscribers worldwide says GSA, with more than half of commercial HSPA networks are capable of peak downlink data speeds of 7.2 Mbps or higher.

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The European Union in a decision this week formally approved the use of 3G and eventually 4G data on the 900MHz and 1800MHz GSM bands. The measure substantially improves the amount of bandwidth available for cellular Internet access in EU states and should render it less expensive as well. Besides reducing the need for more cell sites, allowing frequencies lower than 2100MHz for 3G will also extend the range and coverage of existing service.

The effort follows an initial approval for 900MHz use earlier this year and largely mirrors AT&T’s own efforts in the US, where it had previously been using 1900MHz for the majority of its 3G but now has most areas using 850MHz as well. Adding the second frequency band has been credited to reducing or eliminating major network congestion problems in areas with a heavy concentration of iPhone users, such as New York City and San Francisco.

EU countries now have up to six months to implement the rule change. It’s not yet known how easily cellphone and modem designers could software-modify their devices to use 3G with the the newly cleared spectrum.

http://www.electronista.com/articles/09/10/23/more.airwaves.freed.for.euro.cell.data/