Telecoms markets worldwide are poised to resume growth following the difficult times during the economic slowdown. Demand for content and applications continues to be strong. Mobile data services will be the main engine of growth in both mature and growth markets. Fixed broadband remains a strong business in mature markets, but is facing significant competition from mobile broadband offerings. Fixed–mobile substitution will continue to erode fixed-line revenue. Capex will also recover, as operators invest to increase capacity and reduce their cost-per-bit to support the growing amounts of data traffic.
In mature markets, mobile voice services have become a commodity, so operators will be even more reliant on revenue from mobile data services for growth. The challenge will be to develop new business models that tap into a different source of end-user spending. Fixed operators must exploit the speed advantage that fixed broadband has over mobile broadband. In growth markets, the recent period of rapid growth in subscriber numbers will abate, leaving operators to focus on revenue generation. As most new subscribers will tend to generate lower ARPU, the challenge for operators in growth markets will be to keep costs down to maintain profitability. Regulatory changes, money flowing from mature markets and new entrants will make growth markets more competitive.
This report provides worldwide and eight regional forecasts for telecoms service revenue, capex and subscriber numbers. It offers insight into the main factors that are shaping each region, and the drivers for the overall market, as well as a discussion of the business environment. It also provides recommendations for operators in mature and growth markets.
The Worldwide telecoms market forecast 2010–2014 answers your key questions:
- Which regions will have the highest growth rates and why?
- Which services will drive revenue growth?
- What should operators do in the face of the commoditisation of mobile services?
- How will fixed broadband markets fare given the strength of mobile broadband?
- How do regulatory issues impact the competitive landscape?
- In what ways will growth markets outperform mature markets?