More Phones Than People

The text tells the story of a phone call between two world leaders that helped prevent a nuclear war.

This week marked 50 years since a historic phone call.

Cooper in 1973: A big call made on a large phone

As Statista's Felix Richter reports

,

On April 3, 1973 Motorola engineer Martin Cooper made the world's first mobile phone call while standing on a New York street.

Calling his main rival at Bell Labs Joel Engel to gloat, it is presumed.

The call was made on what would later become the Motorola DynaTAC prototype.

Cooper later recalled

.

"I said, 'Joel this is Marty. I'm calling from a mobile phone, a handheld, portable, real cellphone. The other end was silent. "I suspect he was gnashing his teeth."

Cooper's phone call was a pivotal event in the history

mobile communication

It was the start of a brand new era.

According to GSMA, today, mobile phones have become ubiquitous. Over 5.4 billion people in the world own at least one subscription.

There are more mobile subscriptions now than there are people on earth, since the former has overtaken the latter in 2016.

More infographics can be found at

Statista

According to the

International Telecommunication Union

In 2022 (ITU), more than 8,58 billion mobile subscriptions will be in use around the world, compared with a population of 7,95 billion at half-way through the year.