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The number of mobile subscribers in Brazil grew 1.63 percent in May over April, with 2.95 million new customers added, taking the total to 183.71 million.

Cumulative net additions from January to May 2010 totalled 9.75 million, the best result for this five-month interval since the start of the measurements in 2000. Of the total mobile lines, 151.4 million were prepaid (82.4 percent) and the remaining 32.3 million were postpaid.

Vivo Participações continued as market leader with 55.6 million customers and a market share of 30.25 percent. Telecom Americas (Claro) was second with 46.7 million subscribers (25.41 percent), TIM had 43.8 million (23.84 percent), and Tele Norte Leste Participacoes, S.A. (Oi) was at 37 million customers (20.15 percent).

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Peru’s three main mobile networks, Nextel del Peru, S.A., Claro and Telefónica del Perú have been instructed by the regulator to disconnect any unregistered prepay SIM cards from the start of September this year.

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Claro Brazil aims to launch in the second half its own mobile application shop in the second half. This is a new project and separate from the previously announced plan to create a widget store using the Plaza platform from Qualcomm.

America Movil, the parent company, is currently negotiating for a solution provider. According to the director of value added services (VAS) at Claro, Fiamma Zariffe, the store will be agnostic in terms of operating systems, offering diverse applications for mobile platforms.

America Movil finished 2009 with 201 million mobile customers, up by 6.6 million from September 2009 – 3.4 percent growth. Compared to end-2008, the customer base grew 10.0 percent.

In the fourth quarter, Brazil led the increase in customer numbers, with net additions of 2.1 million, followed by  a gain of 807,000 subscribers in Mexico.

America Movil, which operates under the brand names Claro and Telcel, said it saw a significant increase in postpaid additions compared to a year ago, especially in Mexico, the Dominican Republic and Chile. The company said it beat its subscriber growth target for the year thanks to a quicker-than-expected recovery in the South American economies and substantial growth in data services.

Quarterly revenues rose 13.4 percent year-on-year to MXN 107.1 billion. Services revenues increased almost 15 percent, amid a 48.7 percent jump in data revenues and a 9.3 percent rise in voice revenues. EBITDA improved 16.9 percent to MXN 40.8 billion, helping the margin rise to 38.1 percent from 37.0 percent a year earlier. Net profit fell 17.2 percent to MXN 13 billion, mainly due to higher depreciation and amortisation on GSM networks. Going forward depreciation and amortization charges will be closer to 12.5-13.0 percent of revenues, compared to 16.5 percent in the fourth quarter, the company said.

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Claro Brazil has signed a deal with advertising agency, MyScreen Mobile to offer mobile adverts sometime before the end of this year.  MyScreen’s mobile advertising solution helps brand advertisers deliver targeted full-screen advertisements to opt-in subscribers at the end of every call

America Movil reported third-quarter revenues of MXN 99.8 billion, up 16.9 percent from a year earlier. Services revenues rose 19.5 percent on the back of strong data-revenue growth and a continued increase in the subscriber base. The company, which operates under the name Claro, added a net 4.0 million new susbcribers in the third quarter, of which almost a fourth were postpaid, for a total 194.3 million mobile and 3.8 million fixed-line users at the end of September. Brazil led the way with 1.8 million net gains, followed by Tracfone in the US with 712,000, Mexico with 280,000 and Argentina with 236,000. The company said it some signs of economic recovery in several countries during the quarter, especially in South America. However, subscriber growth remained below last year’s levels, apart from at Tracfone. EBITDA came in at MXN 40.4 billion, up 15.9 percent year-on-year, giving a margin similar to a year ago at 40.5 percent. Net profit jumped 50.6 percent to MXN 18.7 billion, driven by a 82.5 percent decline in financing costs thanks to foreign currency movements. America Movil spent MXN 25.5 billion on capital equipment in the first nine months of 2009, helping to take its 3G coverage to 70 percent of the population in its Latin America markets.