According to the latest market study by ABI Research, Western Europe's mobile service subscribers used 3,077 Exabytes in data traffic by the end of 2012 -- that's up by 39 percent compared to 2011. 3G mobile data usage contributed 64 percent of the total -- while 4G services are still attempting to gain more user adoption. "Moreover, 50 percent of Western Europe has a 3G data plan and they are making full use of it," said Marina Lu, research associate at ABI Research . Clearly, some of that data traffic is due to growth from over-the-top (OTT) software applications that have been downloaded into smartphones. That being said, ABI believes that while mobile data usage is gathering pace, a number of other core metrics are very much in retreat. In most countries around Europe, voice minutes of use has contracted up to 4.5 percent quarter-on-quarter. Similarly, text messaging was down between -0.5 percent and -7.8 percent for those countries quarter-on-quarter. ...
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