The U.S. wireless data market continued to ignore the recession in the fourth quarter of 2008 and grew 7.3 percent quarter over quarter.

In 2008, mobile data services revenues reached $34 billion, according to market researcher Chet Sharma Consulting. Even as the global industry crossed 4 billion in subscriptions and $1 trillion in total revenues, the tension due to economic slowdown has been obvious.

"While the failing economy has started to hit hard on the wireless data ecosystem, especially the infrastructure and handsets segments, consumers haven't really pulled back on mobile data spending overall, just yet," the study says.

"There are sub-segments within mobile data revenue stream that are starting to feel the pinch, like data card subscriptions and downloadables," it says. "Also, in an event of a longer recession, the fate of the U.S. mobile industry will be more closely tied to the overall economy this time compared to the previous recessions."

The Chet Sharma study revealed that the United States crossed 100 million 3G subscribers, catapulting ahead of all industrialized nations in terms of total subscribers.

Last year was a key year for growth in the mobile data services adoption in the U.S. The convergence of 3G, better devices and smartphones and the applications ecosystem set the stage for tremendous growth.

"However, the current recession is not your parent's recession," the study says.

The problems with the economy are so deep and its impact on consumer spending and sentiment is so massive that most economists are scrambling to make sense of it.

Nobody really has a firm grip on how to fix the current mess because a recession of this magnitude complicated by a globalized economy hasn't occurred before, so there is no playbook to lean on.

"We might get lucky and things could turn around in a couple of quarters but things could also take a turn for the worst that might take many more quarters to recover," the study says. "Markets are incredibly volatile and so are the consumers."

The study found that the Christmas quarter might have masked some of the micro trends within the mobile data segment of the industry though Europe started to feel the pinch in the fourth quarter.

Layoffs are certainly having an effect on data card revenues as the enterprises are dropping access cards with employees. Downloadables revenues were down from some segments of the user base as discretionary spending tightens.

Also, there was a shift from postpaid to prepaid in some user segments.

For example, for T-Mobile, prepaid constituted 57 percent of the net-adds in the fourth quarter of 2008, sharply up from 23 percent in the same quarter the year before.

Rising unemployment has accelerated another trend -- landline replacement by mobile which reached almost 20 percent by the last quarter of 2008.

"This trend is irreversible unless new experiences can be introduced," the study says.

Messaging continues to grow. Messaging volume jumped 15 percent and messaging revenue was up 5.5 percent quarter over quarter.

Data access including flat rate data plan subscriptions has also showed significant strength. In addition to smartphones, there is also increased mobile data activity amongst feature phone users.

"Another factor at play is the growth in 3G and smartphone penetration in the U.S. market, both of which have been responsible for increasing the usage and hence the data revenues," the study says.

At the end of the forth quarter, 3G penetration was approximately 40 percent and the data penetration had reached 60 percent.

"Smartphone penetration has been inching up as well," the study said. "In fact, all the service providers and OEMs have been targeting sub-$200 price point, which seems to be a good sweet spot for consumer adoption."