New Delhi, Nov. 4: The country’s telecom subscriber base has crossed 500 million.

According to data released by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai), the country had 509 million subscribers at the end of September, of which 472 million were mobile users.

The government had set the target of giving 500 million connections by 2010.

The milestone has been achieved 15 months ahead of target.

Analysts welcomed the rapidly expanding mobile subscriber base but expressed concern over the saturation in the industry because of intense competition.

“While growth and penetration is welcome, there are concerns over the long-term sustainability of the large number of players in the field,” Mahesh Uppal, director at telecom consulting firm Com First, told The Telegraph.

There are around 14 operators in the country and new players such as Videocon’s Datacom Solutions will be launching services soon.

The number of subscribers in India increased to 509.03 million at the end of September from 494.07 million in August, a growth rate of 3.03 per cent.

Teledensity, or the number of phones in use for every 100 individuals, stands at 43.50 per cent.

High growth rate of mobile services and reduced tariffs have pushed the teledensity beyond 100 per cent in the four metros — Delhi, Mumbai, Calcutta and Chennai.

While the wireless subscriber base has been increasing, Trai data till September show that the number of landline subscribers has been steadily falling .