CTIA president and CEO Steve Largent opened his organization's annual CTIA Wireless I.T. and Entertainment event with a quick pulse check of the industry's subscriber growth. According to Largent, as of June 2007 the U.S. wireless consumer market surpassed the 243 million subscriber mark, representing roughly 81 percent of the overall national population. In addition, U.S. subscribers now send an average of 1 billion text messages everyday, transmitting 28.8 billion messages in June alone. "This is an industry that continues to grow, continues to innovate and continues to diversify," Largent said. -Jason