Ericsson has predicted that total mobile subscriptions are predicted to reach 9.3 billion by 2019.
Currently, about 1.6 billion people across the globe have smartphones.
But as networks expand and more people in international markets and other emerging markets are able to trade in their basic phones, that number is expected to rapidly move up by 60 percent over the next nine years, Ericsson predicts in its reports released Monday.
“The rapid pace of smartphone uptake has been phenomenal and is set to continue,” Douglas Gilstrap, Ericsson Senior Vice President and Head of Startegy says
“It took more than five years to reach the first billion smartphone subscriptions, but it will take less than two to hit the 2 billion mark.”
Smartphone traffic is expected to hit 10 billion gigabytes by 2019, according to the report which reckons that videos will make up about 50 percent of that traffic, with social networking and web services accounting for 10 percent each.
