In 2016, ABI Research forecasts that there will be 103 million 4G wholesale subscribers – subscribers managed through a MVNO that buys wholesale access from a mobile operator – for mobile operators, an increase from just 3.8 million in 2010. 4G wholesale business will help to further widen the mobile device market, encompassing new and existing mobile devices, as well as play an important role for mobile CE devices.
“The 4G wholesale market will be one of the main catalysts in the mobile wireless market in the future,” says Philip Solis, research director, mobile networks. “These forecasts are conservative, we believe, with mobile consumer electronics vendors’ adoption of this model being one factor that could greatly impact the potential of this market.”
