ISLAMABAD: New taxes on mobile internet have slowed the growth of consumers, however, the number of 3G and 4G subscribers in the country has reached 15.75 million till August.
During August 2015, mobile phone companies added a total of 1.15 million mobile broadband (3G/4G) users with Zong and Telenor topping the charts. The 3G and 4G services that picked up amazingly during 2014 saw a slow growth during this year.
Earlier due to SIM re-verification drive when telcos stopped majority of commercial activities and focused entirely on re-verification of their customers base and then new taxes broke the tempo of new 3G subscriptions.
Meanwhile, mobile phone companies managed to add 2.5 million new mobile phone users to their networks, said recently issued statistics from Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA).
Taking to the total toll to 118.94 million, all telecom operators added notable number of new subscriptions despite the fact that all new subscriptions go through biometrics verification procedures.
Mobilink lead the market with its 34.63 million customers while it added 643,749 new subscriptions during August 2015. Telenor stood second with 32.74 million customers where as it added 592,067 new phone users to its network during the month.
Zong added 668,062 customers during the reported duration to take its total number of customers to 23.10 million while Ufone was able to grab 403,121 new subscribers and it total count of mobile phone users reached 18.29 million.
