Pelephone Israel Reveals Mobile Internet Information

Pelephone Israel launched today a new HSPA+ network (3.75G) providing download speeds of up to 21Mbps. Pelephone ("wonder-phone" in Hebrew) is the mobile subsidiary of Bezeq, the Israeli incumbent carrier and was the first mobile operator in Israel, when it was established in 1986.

After going through AMPS and CDMA cellular technologies, the company is now based on GSM. Pelephone has 2.8M subscribers, of which 1.6M are 3G subscribers (end of Q1, 2010).

During the launch event the company exposed some information on their Mobile Broadband subscriber base:

• Pelephone has 102,000 subscribers using mobile connected laptops (with Pelephone's "NetStick" USB dongle or built-in modem). They make 6.3% of the operator's high speed connected devices.
   
• Total data traffic on Pelephone's network reached 171TB during the last month, of which 84% is generated by the above laptops. This brings the average monthly consumption of a laptop subscriber  to 1.67GB,

With the recent FCC report ("FCC Annual Wireless Report: Mobile Internet Usage Information" - here) we can compare these numbers to the US. The share of laptop users in the US is 8.4% (Vs. 6.3% for Pelephone), and the average monthly consumption 1.41 GB/Month (Vs. 1.67 GB for Pelephone). Note while Pelephone's numbers are current, the US numbers are more than a year old.