Research from the European Commissions statistics group, Eurostat, has revealed that the number of Europeans giving up their fixed-line phones for a mobile has increased to an average of 18%.

In some countries, such as Lithuania, 48% of households have replaced their land line with a mobile (note: admittedly many never had a land line in the first place). Curiously the trend is most prevalent in newer EU member states, with older countries such as France, the UK and Germany sitting on just 14%, 13% and 11% respectively:


This isn't to say that fixed-line services are being completely pushed out; in fact the number of lines per 100 people has grown from 43 in 1995 to 48 in 2005. Mobile Broadband services may well find stronger markets in Eastern Europe, if they were made cheap enough.