Nigeria has the third highest mobile subscriptions additions in the first quarter of 2021 globally, says the latest mobility report by multinational telecommunications company, Ericsson.

Ericsson’s Vice President and Head of Ericsson South and East Africa, Todd Ashton, made this known on Tuesday during a virtual press briefing to launch the company’s latest mobility report.

The report said that India had the most net additions of  (+26 million), followed by China (+6 million) and Nigeria (+3 million).

Ashton said: “Positioned as the third-highest mobile subscriptions additions in Q1 2021 globally, Nigeria is growing tremendously setting Africa in motion.

He noted that the growth could be attributed to the young, growing population, the increasing digital skills, and the more affordable smartphones.

“Correspondingly, this growth is reflected in the online habits of the country where the dependency on online activities for daily tasks is expected to remain high in the future.”

It said the net addition of mobile subscriptions was quite low during the first quarter(Q1) of  2021, at 59 million.

Ericsson said this was likely due to the pandemic and associated lockdown restrictions.

The report reveals that despite the uncertainty caused by COVID-19, service providers continue to switch on 5G, and more than 160 service providers have launched commercial 5G services.

It also features breakout statistics from Sub-Saharan African markets where around 15 percent of mobile subscriptions were for 4G at the end of 2020.

Mobile broadband subscriptions in Sub-Saharan Africa are predicted to increase, reaching 76 percent of mobile subscriptions by 2026, it said.

According to the report, 5G volumes are not expected to grow in the sub-Saharan region by 2021 but are likely to reach around 70 million 5G subscriptions in 2026.

Separately, the Global Telecom Market Report (GTM), also known as “The Future of Urban Reality Report”, was also recently launched by the Ericsson ConsumerLab.

It was launched to assess the penetration of 5G and the tremendous potential it holds to markets around the world.

According to the company, the latest  ConsumerLab report is Ericsson’s largest consumer study to date, revealing key insights about what Nigerian consumers believe will happen beyond the pandemic, into the year 2025.

Ericsson surveyed a sample of 1,000 to 2,000 respondents between the ages of 15–79.

The report shows that when entering the “next to normal”, consumers in Africa will have added an average of 3.4 percent of online services to their daily online activities.

It also says that the time they spend online would increase by 10 hours per week by 2025, in comparison to their pre-pandemic habits.

Ericsson says this move is also expected to bridge the gap between moderate and advanced online users, with the more moderate online users having introduced more online services in their daily life over the course of the pandemic.

It said that due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the implementation of online education at schools and universities as well as remote working in Nigeria has increased to 72 percent and 62 percent, respectively.

The report stated that going forward online education and remote working were collectively expected to remain at a level of 29 percent.

It said that before the COVID-19 pandemic, the amount of online shopping in Nigeria stood at 35 percent out of the total number of all shopping events, both online and at physical stores.

“During the COVID-19  pandemic, this figure increased to 51 percent.

“Nigerian consumer’s online shopping is anticipated to remain at a level of 44 percent after the COVID-19 pandemic has passed,” it said.