000 as the threshold of disposable income is related in telecommunications cost in terms of current tariffs. Ultimately tariffs will be set in a competitive market and this means that prices will fall. Impacts on global demand of rising incomes in the developing world What we can expect is a major expansion in the numbers of mobile users, firstly up to 2010 as the disposable income rises for around 1.5 billion people around the world, especially in China and India. However in the next phase, the power of the new consumer economy in the developing world will destroy the margins of the incumbent operators built up over the past 100 years through competition, as depicted in the Figure 2.6. 34 Beyond 2010, some one billion new subscribers, as described above, may be expected to enter the market as tariffs reduce, with new networking technology which has lower costs and faster rollout. Handset prices in mass production can also be expected to sink. Nokia is already selling simpler handsets that cost under USD 30 to produce and by 2010 global low-end handset prices of USD 10-20 can be expected from Asia. However when tariffs are genuinely cost-based due to competition, the price of a call can be expected to fall to fractions of a US cent. This gives impetus to a INFRASTRUCTURE TO 2030: TELECOM, LAND TRANSPORT, WATER AND ELECTRICITY - ISBN 92-64-02398-4 © OECD 2006 2. TELECOMS INFRASTRUCTURE TO 2030 Figure 2.6. Global user population growth With globalisation, OECD cost levels of services and handsets will slowly be rebalanced, being set by average world prices. Saturation is set by affordable price for the majority of users - numbers which may reach 65% of a global population of over 8.2 Bn by 2030 (US Census Bureau, 2005) if world usage goes towards average OECD levels of saturation today: 5.3 Bn users. Potential usage in the lowest 30% of the world's population is largely saturated while other regions are also almost saturated, so growth slows down Communications and Web access at low prices spreads with development 