Market research firm Infonetics Research has published a report detailing the sales of W-CDMA/HSPA, CDMA2000/EV-DO, TD-SCDMA, and LTE mobile broadband equipment. It says the recession resulted in fourth-quarter sales being lower than expected but, despite this, sales figures from plug-in and embedded mobile broadband equipment were up 55% in 2009 compared to 2008. The total value of mobile broadband kit was $6.4 billion worldwide, while the number of mobile broadband subscribers overtook the number of fixed DSL subscribers. A total of 1.5 billion mobile broadband customers are expected worldwide by in 2014.
Mobile broadband PC cards, including USB dongles, accounted for 74% of total mobile broadband card revenue in 2009. Embedded mobile broadband cards on PCs, netbooks, and mobile internet devices made up the remaining 26%.