Mobile phone users in the UAE paid nearly Dh20 billion in bills to Etisalat and du last year, providing the two service providers with nearly 77 per cent of their total income, official data showed on Monday.

At the end of June 2012, mobile phone subscribers in the second largest Arab economy totaled 12.74 million, an increase of nearly one million since the beginning of the year, the figures showed.

Etisalat, one of the largest telecom firms in the Middle East, had around seven million subscribers at the end of June, controlling nearly 55 per cent of the local GSM market. Du had nearly 5.7 million, a share of 45 per cent.

The figures, published in the semi official daily Alittihad, showed mobile phone revenue accounted for nearly 77 per cent of the overall income of Etisalat and Du. “Mobile phone users paid around Dh20 billion in bills to the two companies out of their total revenue of Dh26 billion in 2011,” the report said, citing data by the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority.

It showed pre-paid GSM users accounted for nearly 88 per cent of the total mobile phone subscribers in the UAE, standing at 11.22 million in June.

With an estimated population of 8.2 million, the UAE had a mobile phone penetration ratio of 155 per cent in June, one of the highest in the world.

The report showed Etisalat and Du had 1.1 million fixed line users in June, including around 546,000 subscribers in Du.