Blockbuster mobile phone sales during the holiday season last year propelled shipments to more than 1 billion for all of 2006, market researcher IDC said Thursday.Handset vendors shipped a record-high 294.9 million mobile phones in the last three months of 2006, propelling the full year total to 1.02 billion, according to IDC.The fourth-quarter figure was 20 percent higher than the same period in 2005, while the full-year figure beat the 832.8 million wireless handsets sold in 2005.Developing nations propelled handset sales last year, the market researcher said. Nations in emerging market areas of Asia, Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Latin America accounted for a higher portion of mobile phone purchases last year than mature areas such as North America, Japan and Western Europe. Developing nations will continue to widen their lead over modern countries, IDC said. Many people in developing areas still don’t have handsets, and it takes less time and money to build than a landline network, making mobile phones a better choice for less affluent countries, IDC said. Mobile phones are also seen as status symbols in many emerging markets.China, for example, finished 2006 with 461.1 million mobile phone subscribers, adding 67.7 million new users during the year, according to its Ministry of Information Industry. India is also growing fast, increasing subscriber numbers by nearly 74 million new wireless users to end with a total of 149.5 million last year. Despite the big numbers, there is plenty of room to grow. China’s population is estimated at 1.4 billion people now, and India’s was nearly 1.11 billion at the end of last year. -Dan Nystedt, IDG News Service (Taipei Bureau)Related Link: India Nearly Doubles Mobile Phone Use in ’06Check out our CIO News Alerts and Tech Informer pages for more updated news coverage. Related content BrandPost Stay in Control of Your Data with a Secure and Compliant Sovereign Cloud By Stan Kwong Mar 23, 2023 6 mins Cloud Security Cloud Computing News Accenture to lay off 19,000 to cut costs amid economic uncertainty Technology services giant Accenture will continue to hire but meanwhile is cutting staff to streamline operations in the face of economic headwinds. By Anirban Ghoshal Mar 23, 2023 2 mins IT Consulting Services Technology Industry BrandPost Advice from procurement: How to evaluate and propose new IT investments By clearly defining needs and requirements, evaluating TCO, and performing risk assessments, procurement and IT teams can work together to help their business leaders make more informed decisions for an improved bottom line. By Bo Bradshaw, Edgio Procurement Director Mar 23, 2023 5 mins SaaS BrandPost Why AI is key to hiring and retaining developers Data shows that the opportunity to build AI-powered apps figures very prominently in where developers decide to work. By Bryan Kirschner, Vice President, Strategy at DataStax Mar 23, 2023 4 mins Artificial Intelligence IT Leadership Podcasts Videos Resources Events SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER From our editors straight to your inbox Get started by entering your email address below. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe