Saudi mobile phone subscriptions topped 41 million at the end of the third quarter, beating expectations from several analysts as competition between the kingdom's three operators hotted up. "The market penetration for this service has reached 162 percent," the Communications and Information Technology Commission said in a statement late on Saturday.
The figures beat expectations by EFG-Hermes, rising 13 percent from last year's 36 million subscriptions and a penetration rate of 144 percent. The increased subscriptions in the three months to September are credited to increased competition between a trio of telecommunication companies in a country that has a growing population of 25 million.