Sovereignty, Resilience and Trust: Strengthening Europe’s Digital Economy After covid-19

$0.4tn (1.1% of 
income growth 
2000-2019)
$0.3tn (0.7% of 
income per capita 
growth 2000-2019)
$1.8tn (4.7% of 
income growth 
2000-2019)
 
Income growth attributable to mobile uptake
Income growth attributable to 4G upgrades
Income growth attributable to 3G upgrades
Figure 4. Income growth, accumulated since 2000, driven by mobile technology (trillion)
Source: GSMA Intelligence
While it is informative to know the extent to which 
income grew from 2000 to 2019 as a result of 
mobile technology expansion, it is also important 
to assess how much the benefits of mobile 
technology weigh in the entire economy. In the 
last two decades, developing countries have seen 
benefits from mobile technology grow substantially 
to represent over 4.3% of their GDP – above the 
2.8% in developed countries. As Figure 5 shows, 
however, the absolute gains of mobile technology 
(that is, in dollar terms) in developed markets are 
higher.14 
Benefits from mobile technology have been greater in developing 
countries in relative terms, but more substantial in developed countries 
in absolute terms
14. 
This is primarily related to these economies being larger in absolute terms.

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13
Mobile technology and economic growth
2. Economic impacts from existing deployments of 2G, 3G and 4G
$0
$0.2
$0.4
$0.6
$0.8
$1.0
$1.2
$1.4
$1.6
$1.8
2000 200
1
200
2
200
3
2005
2004
2006 200
7
2008 2009 20
10
20
11
20
12
20
13
20
14
20
15
20
16
20
17
20
18
20
19
1.3% of GDP 
($0.5tn)
2.8% of GDP 
($1.5tn)
4.3% of GDP 
($1.4tn)
0.3% of GDP 
($0.03tn)
Developed
Developing