17 May 2012
“Romania registered increases in the number of fixed and mobile broadband connections in 2011. We also had growths in the fixed Internet segment, mostly in terms of connections installed to residential users and connections installed in the rural area. In the mobile Internet segment, the most significant evolution was registered by the number of connections achieved over the mobile phone, by way of a subscription or of an extra-option dedicated for Internet access. Furthermore, the share of the connections with at least 30 Mbps speed continued to rise within the total fixed connections concomitantly with the more frequent use of the mobile Internet equipment, the monthly average traffic of a mobile Internet user reaching 220MB. All these factors contributed to the increase of the revenues obtained from the provision of Internet access services in 2011, by 4% as compared to 2010, up to 2 billion lei”, the President of ANCOM, Catalin Marinescu, said today, 17 May, in the opening speech he held at the 16th edition of the “Communications Day”, where he presented the statistical data report on the market of Internet access services at end-2011, published by ANCOM.
This report shows that the number of fixed broadband Internet access connections amounted to 3.26 million, more by 4% as compared to mid-2011 and, respectively, by 9% as compared to end-2010. The most significant growth in the second half of 2011 was registered by the UTP/FTP cable connections (+6% half-yearly and +14% annually), which reached 1.8 million, followed by the xDSL connections (+4% half-yearly and +11% annually), with 1 million connections. Furthermore, the coaxial cable connections decreased by -4% half-yearly and -9% yearly, down to 0.4 million.
Within the total fixed broadband Internet access connections, 2.9 million connections (89%) use the FTTx technology, which employs the fibre optic up to the end-user’s premises or to a specific point in the proximity of the end-users’ premises, wherefrom the connection is achieved over other technologies (e.g. coaxial cable, radio, UTP/FTP cable, xDSL), and thus the operators are able to offer high connection speeds.
The penetration rate of fixed broadband Internet access connections per 100 inhabitants grew in 2011 by 1.5 percentage points up to 17.1%, while the penetration rate per 100 households also grew by 3.6 percentage points, reaching 41.6%.
Out of the 3.26 million fixed broadband Internet access connections reported by the end of the last year, 2.95 million were used by residential subscribers (+4% half-yearly and +9% annually) and 0.31 million connections have been installed to business subscribers (+3% half-yearly and +2% annually).
In the second half of 2011, the connections installed in the rural area grew more significantly (+14%) up to 0.68 million connections, whereas in the urban area these rose by only 2%, up to 2.58 million connections.
As regards the speed of the fixed Internet connections, one may notice the increase of the number of high speed connections (at least 30 Mbps), which hold a share of almost 50% within the total number of fixed connections. Moreover, in terms of high speed connections, Romania had the fastest connection speed among the EU Member States as of 1 July 2011, according to the most recent report on broadband services published by the European Commission. We expect to find Romania on one of the leading positions at end-2011 as well.
According to the data provided by the 6 providers of mobile broadband Internet access connections, the total number of active mobile broadband Internet access connections amounted to 4.23 million, up by 20% half-yearly and by 39% yearly. Thus, the providers reported 3.11 million active mobile broadband connections achieved on mobile phones and 1.12 million active mobile broadband connections achieved over modems/cards/USB (used for connecting to the Internet the laptops, tablets or desktops).
According to the report published today by ANCOM, the total number of terminals/SIM cards allowing for mobile Internet access by means of 3G (including 3G+) or EV-DO technologies grew by 15% in the last semester of 2011 to 5.9 million. The monthly average traffic achieved by a mobile Internet user amounted to 220 MB, while there is a notable difference between the monthly average traffic achieved over modems/cards/USB (1,150 MB) and that of the traffic achieved over mobile phones (30 MB).
The revenues obtained from the provision of Internet access services amounted to 2 billion lei in 2011 (up by 4% as compared to 2010), accounting for approx. 13% of the telecom market total value.
The statistical data report was elaborated based upon the data reported by the providers of Internet access, leased line and data transmission services who carried out commercial activities from 1 July to 31 December 2011 and is available for consultation here.
Conexiunile mobile de internet în bandă largă au crescut cu aproape 40% în anul 2011