Bermuda?s newest mobile phone operator turned has marked its fifth anniversary by noting that it is the fastest growing telecommunications company in the Caribbean, with a compound annualised growth rate of 69 percent.

?This record growth rate is unrivalled among the world?s other mobile phone providers,? said Colm Delves, Digicel?s group chief executive officer.

Digicel currently operates in 16 Caribbean countries with an average market share of 63 percent across the Islands.

While Digicel is incorporated in Bermuda, it only actually entered the Bermuda market last December after acquiring Cingular?s operations in June 2005.

The company has not released its market share figures for Bermuda. However just after it entered the market in November, Research Innovations conducted a survey which found that Cellular One was the market leader here with 43.8 percent of its sector, compared to 34.4 percent for BTC Mobility/M3 and 21 percent for Digicel. Digicel has said its market share has changed since that poll however it has not revealed any new figures.

?With ten more Caribbean nations whose telecommunications marketplaces are yet to be liberalised, we expect exponential growth over the next five years,? he said adding that customers who are underserviced and dissatisfied have voted their fingers in every market that Digicel has entered.

In November, Digicel and Cellular One were in a statistical dead heat for customer satisfaction, according to the Research Innovations poll. The survey survey which found 35.1 percent of Digicel customers were ?very satisfied? with their cellular or wireless provider compared to 34.8 percent for Cellular One. For both companies, 61 percent said they were ?somewhat satisfied?. Satisfaction figures for M3 were not given.

Digicel plans to build a new state-of-the-art headquarters in Kingston for its Jamaican staff base of 1,000.