The number of Ukrainian mobile phone subscribers fell by 179,000 in March to 55.42 million, consultants Advanced Communications & Media said Thursday.

The country's two biggest operators, Kyivstar, controlled by Norway's Telenor ASA (TEL.OS) and OAO Mobile TeleSystems (MBT), continued to lose market share to Turkcell-controlled (TKC) Astelit.

AC&M gave the following breakdown of the largest operators' subscriber numbers in the country.

 
 Operator    January      December 
 Kyivstar    23.05 Mln    23.33 Mln 
 UMC         17.94 Mln    18.02 Mln 
 Astelit     11.48 Mln    11.33 Mln 
 VimpelCom    1.88 Mln     1.91 Mln

Consultancy Web site: www.acm-consulting.com

-By Will Bland, Dow Jones Newswires; +7 495 937 8445; william.bland@dowjones.com