Nepal has 9.63 million telephony users

Nepal has 9.63 million telephony users till September 14, up from 9.34 million telephony users at August 14, according to figures from the Nepal Telecommunications Authority (NTA).
The mobile operators has 8.30 million subscribers by September 14 -- up from 8.03 million a month earlier. "Of the total, 7.46 million were GSM users -- up from 7.21 million a month earlier and the remainder use Nepal Telecom's (NT) CDMA service, called Sky Phone.
Nepal Telecom led in GSM subscribers with a customer base of 4.03 million, followed by Spice Nepal (Ncell) with 3.43 million, according to the NTA data till September 14.
The competition between the telecom service providers is increasing as they both are trying to out do each other.
Nepal Telecom further ended the period with 4,099 3G subscribers, similar to the previous month. The number of fixed telephony users in Nepal stood at 840,104 -- up from 838,026 in mid-August. "Of the total, 597,085 were PSTN users and 243,019 were WLL users," the data revelas.
Nepal Telecom had 587,457 PSTN users, followed by STM Telecom Sanchar with 4,841 customers, Nepal Satellite Telecom with 885 customers, and Smart with 3,902 PSTN customers.
Nepal Telecom also had 173,326 WLL users and UTL had 69,693 WLL subscribers.
Meanwhile, Nepal counted 2.10 million internet users as of September 14, up from 1.76 million internet users a month earlier, and the penetration rate stood at 7.49 per cent.
Some 1.88 million people connect to the internet using GPRS, followed by 101,464 internet users that connect through CDMA 1X. Some 49,406 people use ADSL and there were also 32,500 cable internet users, and 27,137 dial-up users.
Similarly, 13,000 internet users connect through wireless or fibre optic technologies, according to the data.
Recently, Ncell -- the Nepali subsidiary company of TeliaSonera -- has launched the world's highest mobile base station to provide 3G signal at Everest Base Camp.
The installation will also help tens of thousands of tourists and trekkers who visit the world's highest mountain every year. The 3G services will be fast enough to make video calls and use the Internet, said the company, which also claims the world's lowest 3G base at 1,400 metres below sea level in a mine in Europe.