Worldwide mobile telephone subscriptions reached 3.3 billion--equivalent to half the global population--on Thursday, 26 years after the first cellular network was launched, research firm Informa said in a new Reuters article.

The past several years have seen particularly strong growth in both India and China, the two largest potential markets in the world.

But the article also issued a note of caution: "although mobile subscriptions have reached the equivalent of 50 percent of the population, this does not mean that half the people in the world now have a mobile phone." Informa said 59 countries have mobile penetration of over 100 percent, meaning that some owners probably have more than one phone.

Worldwide Cell Phone Use Reaches 50 Percent [Reuters]