Roaming recorded a fall, operators face revenue loss

PRESS RELEASE                                                        

Total revenue on the electronic communications market recorded a fall of 4.9% in the first nine months of 2020, mainly due to a decrease in roaming traffic. At the same time, the overall Internet traffic in fixed and mobile networks increased 36%.

ZAGREB, 14 December 2020 – In the first nine months of 2020, total revenue on the electronic communications market recorded a fall of  4.9% compared to the end of September last year. The decrease in overall revenues was mostly influenced by a 13.5 per cent decrease in revenues from fixed and mobile phone services, while a 2 per cent growth in revenues on the broadband market and a 3 per cent growth in the pay TV market were insufficient to compensate for lower revenues from the telephone services provided.

In the third Quarter of 2020, the electronic communications market continued to be strongly affected by the coronavirus pandemic. Given the situation, data traffic as well as the number of minutes of mobile phone conversations, expectedly increased in relation to the period in 2019. In the third Quarter, the data traffic reached a total of 567 petabytes (PB). In comparison to the first nine months of 201, this was a 36% increase.
In relation to the end of September last year, the total number of outgoing minutes in the mobile networks increased by 12 %, but the revenues from phone service in mobile network  decreased by 12 percent, mostly due to lower roaming traffic. The third quarter shows the impact of the pandemic on international travel and tourism in Croatia, as the users’ roaming minutes s dropped 11 %t, as well as the duration of calls by foreigners in roaming of Croatian mobile networks, 29 %, compared to the first three quarters of 2019.

Total investments in tangible and intangible property in immobile networks are slightly in a fall by 0.2 %, although the investment growth was recorded in the fibre access technology by 12.9 % and the investment growth in the construction of electronic communications infrastructure by 70.8 %. Therefore, a continued trend of investment in broadband access infrastructure can be expected in the coming period, important in order to maintain the growth in the number of high-speed broadband connections. In the mobile network, investments in network increased by 0.3% compared to the first nine months since 2019.

Looking at broadband connections in the fixed network, the number of connections via access network continues is recording the highest growth, with about 10% of users achieving broadband internet access via FTTH/FTTB connections. As far as speeds are concerned, about 40% of immobile users have access to the Internet at speeds greater than 30 Mbit/s, or over 12% at speeds greater than 100 Mbit/s. The total number of users of packages increases in all package categories: 2D, 3D and above all 4D packages. Pay-Tv services are used by just over 56% of households.
For more information on data on the electronic communications market in the third quarter please contact the following link.
 

                                   
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For additional information please contact:
Croatian Regulatory Authority for Network Industries (HAKOM)
Roberta Frangeša Mihanovića 9
10110 Zagreb, Croatia
Tel. + 385 (0) 1 700 70 07
Fax + 385 (0)1 700 70 70
 
Media inquiries can be submitted online using HAKOM’s official website: https://www.hakom.hr/
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