The GSMA, which represents the interests of the worldwide mobile communications industry, has revealed that nearly 100 million of the worlds 4 billion mobile connections are via Mobile Broadband services.

It's also estimated that fixed-line broadband connections are only capable of reaching one sixth (1.1 billion) of the world's population, thus leaving plenty of room for future Mobile Broadband growth.

However it's unclear whether these statistics differentiate between those who merely buy Mobile Broadband equipped handsets, but probably don't use the Internet, and those who buy USB Modem (Dongles) and Laptops specifically for accessing the service itself.

Elsewhere the European Information Technology Observatory (EITO) has predicted that UK mobile data services will see their turnover rise by 9.8% to £6.34bn this year.