Fastest Growing Broadband Markets Revealed

Infrastructure competition, relative pricing and regulatory involvement have been identified as common factors that are driving broadband growth in such countries. Qualitative analysis also highlights unique market characteristics at a country level.

Jonathan Coham, Ovum analyst based in London, said: “At a time when broadband is quickly reaching saturation point in most developed markets, less developed markets across the globe continue to exhibit extremely high levels of growth. However, in many of these countries huge barriers still exist that could inevitably limit the broadband markets.”

Out of all the countries, Greece, Philippines, Indonesia, India, Ukraine, Ireland, Thailand, Vietnam, Russia and Turkey rank in the Top 10.

“Wealth relative to the cost of broadband is a major consideration in most of these markets. Broadband ISPs in Greece, Turkey, Ireland and Russia all offer cheap services relative to the average disposable income in order to make broadband attractive to greater proportions of the country. This has helped to drive uptake of broadband services.”

Coham added: “Regulation surrounding wholesale and LLU broadband pricing (in the case of DSL) is also a major factor to consider in these regions, as is fixed line and PC penetration. In a growing number of cases, demand for content is helping to fuel broadband growth, as operators incorporate TV and VoD services into their offerings early on.”

Recent research from Point Topic revaeled that the market for consumer broadband value-added services (BVAS) grew by 81% during 2006 (see Consumer BVAS revenues up 81% in 2006).

The Office of National Statistics recently published a report showing that the number of UK households connected to the internet has jumped by almost one million in the last year alone, to reach over 15 million (see Household Internet Connectivity Rises To Over 15 Million).