Czech mobile operator Eurotel Prague added 282,000 subscribers last year, helping it boost its total user base to 4.68 million and leapfrog rival T-Mobile Czech to become the biggest player in the domestic market. The Deutsche Telekom-backed cellco was top dog at mid-2005, but according to Eurotel spokesman Pavel Kaidl, the company signed up roughly 187,000 new users during the last quarter, to help it regain its leading position in the market. T-Mobile, meanwhile, added around 274,000 customers to end the year with 4.63 million, and Oskar Vodafone added 310,000 clients – the biggest growth of the three – to lift its base to 2.14 million. By the start of 2006 the Czech Republic was home to 11.45 million registered customers, a year-on-year increase of 866,000. Although officially there are around 112 mobile phones per 100 of the population, it is estimated that about 20% of Czechs do not have a cellphone.
Mr Kaidl added that the number of customers using one of the cellco’s data services for accessing the internet access, WAP services or MMS messages, reached more than 700,000 at end-2005. Meanwhile, customers using CDMA technology for an internet connection doubled during the year to 70,000.