Acision powers record SMS traffic during Christmas and New Year across Asia Pacific
15 January 2008
Acision, the messaging and charging company of choice for over 300 network operators and service providers worldwide, today announced that according to their figures, global SMS traffic over the 2007/2008 New Year period increased by 30 per cent compared to the same period last year. Around the world, phone users sent a staggering 43 billion text messages to wish their loved ones a happy New Year – of which more than 23 billion were successfully processed through Acision’s systems.
“Since the commercial introduction of SMS by Acision 15 years ago, mobile users generally prefer to use SMS to communicate with loved ones during special events like Christmas and New Year. The popularity of SMS can be attributed to its ease of use, speed of delivery and convenience to communicate with multiple recipients.” said Boudewijn Pesch, Managing Director of Acision, Asia Pacific. “The surge in SMS traffic during this festive season is a clear indication that the service continues to be a favourite method of communication for the millions of people in Asia Pacific, and will remain so as we move into 2008.”
In Asia Pacific, Acision revealed the countries with the highest SMS traffic processed over the festive season. Unsurprisingly the world’s most prolific sender of text messages, the Philippines, again tops the ranking with 1.39 billion messages, closely followed by Indonesia, Malaysia, Taiwan, Singapore and Thailand.
Philippines
Known as one of the world’s largest SMS markets, this festive season was no exception as Filipinos sent an astonishing 1.39 billion text messages, among a subscriber base of 50 million, a clear indication that SMS still remains the communication mode of choice.
Indonesia
As one of the fastest growing mobile markets in South East Asia, Indonesian operators recognise that festive seasons generally place high demands on their network assets. With many of operators conducting capacity upgrades months in advance to meet and manage the anticipated traffic spikes, a total of 990 million messages were processed during the year end period.
Malaysia
Acision is the partner of choice in Malaysia where all three local operators have deployed Acision’s SMSC systems to power their mobile messaging services. The country’s mobile operators – Celcom, DiGi and Maxis – collectively processed a record-breaking 951 million SMS messages during the festive period.
Taiwan
With a mobile penetration rate of 101% and a population of 22 million, Taiwan is one of the most progressive mobile communications markets in Asia Pacific with all of the mobile network operators operating 3G networks. With a total of 200 million SMS messages, an average of 9 texts sent per person over the festive period, SMS still reigns as one of the most popular forms of communication, even in an advanced 3G market like Taiwan.
Singapore
With 5.432 million mobile subscribers and 116% mobile penetration rate, this island nation processed on average 1 billion messages per month during 2007. During Christmas and New Year, which is considered a peak holiday and travel season in Singapore, a total of 180 million SMS messages were processed as residents and tourists alike sent well wishes to their friends and families.
Thailand
In the land famous for its warm smiles and infamous for its traffic jams, New Year revellers rang in the year with over 113 million SMS messages sent through the mobile networks – without network congestion. In addition to person-to-person messaging, which formed the largest portion of SMS traffic, value-added services were also popular over the New Year period. For example, local party-goers were able to obtain the latest status update on Bangkok street traffic congestion using a free SMS service provided by the Thai transport authority.
“With SMS traffic again expected to scale new heights and reach trillions of messages in 2008, and considering that text messaging represents a strategic part of mobile revenues, operators recognise the critical need for a robust and reliable SMS infrastructure and a high quality end-to-end SMS solution rather than a mix of separate point solutions, such as a direct delivery router.” Said Pesch. “This means operators are continuing to place their trust in the Acision high performance SMSC, the world’s most scalable system which offers an unrivalled feature set in addition to powerful store and forward capabilities.”
“As the world’s leading innovator in mobile messaging, Acision is fully aligned with the business objectives and strategies of mobile operators in Asia Pacific, and will continue to be the partner of choice in the face of expected messaging market growth in 2008.”
NOTES TO EDITORS
About Acision
Acision is the messaging and charging company of choice for more than 300 network operators and service providers, supporting over one and a half billion customers worldwide. With over 50% of global text and multimedia messaging traffic generated through its platforms, Acision’s mobile data services expertise includes text messaging, multimedia messaging, IP messaging, mobile internet, mobile advertising, IP voicemail and IP videomail. Acision’s payment systems have processed more than US $100 billion, providing sophisticated real-time charging and removing the boundaries between prepaid and postpaid subscriptions. Helping operators to grow their mobile data revenues for over 43 years, Acision has a detailed understanding of what it takes to bring innovative services to full mass market adoption.
Privately owned by an equity consortium led by Atlantic Bridge Ventures and Access Industries, Acision is a half billion dollar company, working with customers in 135 countries across six continents. More information is available at www.acision.com
Press contacts
Radha Raman
Marketing Director, Asia Pacific, Acision
Tel: +65 6505 1021
Email: radha.raman@acision.com
Kevin Foo / Rani Ramaya
Upstream Asia
Tel: +65 6323 7377
Email: acision@upstreamasia.com