CARRIERS ARE RESPONDING — in some cases, with significant investments. In the U.S., T-Mobile’s recent network upgrades reportedly cost $4 billion. That’s just part of category-wide capital expenditures (CapEx) expected to reach $1.4 trillion globally by 2020. Not surprisingly, there is risk associated with this kind of capital outlay. An analysis of 45 carriers by the telecommunications research firm Ovum published in 2014 found a CapEx increase of 3 percent year-over-year but revenue growth of The low return on investment puts just 0.6 percent. According to Ovum and GSMA, pressure on carriers to find new ways the largest association of mobile carriers in the to increase revenue, which is tricky world, the industry’s compound annual growth in a market that is still developing, rate (CAGR) between 2014 and 2019 will improve highly competitive, and that faces to as much as 2.5 percent. In past years, that increasing costs to comply with new number reached as high as 4 percent. government regulations. 33