South Korean regulators have decided to let mobile operators charge users extra fees for VOIP applications or block their use entirely, according to a report by Networks Asia.
 
As per the report, Korea’s top mVoIP app, KakaoTalk, has gained rapid popularity among smartphone users. Other players in the mVoIP market include Microsoft’s Skype, Google Voice, Fring, Line 2 as well as other independent and operator-driven services.
 
 With widespread use of these mobile applications adding data traffic and cutting into their text and voice profits, the major Korean operators – SK Telecom, KT and LG Uplus – have decided to raise prices for data usage, as revealed in the report. As the country’s regulator is allowing the telcos to charge for use of apps such as KakaoTalk, some are claiming that this is a violation of net neutrality rules.
 
 The report claims that Jiho Park, an activist with the Citizens’ Coalition for Economic Justice, said that this will set a precedent for coming apps such as FaceTime, where SKT and KT already said they will apply the same pricing policy as with local apps, and this can clash with global players like Apple and Google.
 
Apple’s FaceTime is only available on Wi-Fi networks now but with iOS6 this fall, people will be able to use it over 3G or 4G LTE, too. SK Telecom and KT currently offer unlimited data plans, which allow users to freely download apps on their networks, whereas LG U+ used to block over-the-top programs entirely. The companies have not yet released specific information on their new rates, says the report.
 
KakaoTalk has 36 million Korean users and 9.2 million international users. More than half of 50 million Korean cell phone owners use smartphones, according to the Korea Communications Commission (KCC).
 
The Korean government released its open Internet guidelines last year, designed after the U.S. network neutrality rules released by the Federal Communications Commission last year. Under these principles, consumers can make their own choices about what applications and services to use and what content they want to access, create or share with others.
 
Unofficially, the KCC has already permitted operators to enact policies of their choice regarding third-party apps, as per the report.

Source: Wireless Federation.

Globe Telecom has entered into an agreement with Vonage Holdings, a leading provider of international voice-over-internet protocol (VoIP) phone services for home and small business users, to deliver low-cost international calls to and from the Philippines. With a three million-strong Filipino diaspora currently residing in the US, both firms are looking to capitalise on the potential growth opportunities to be had from VoIP call services.

In a separate development, Globe says it has selected Sybase 365, a subsidiary of mobile messaging and mobile commerce services developer Sybase Inc, to expand its global IPX connectivity via a suite of trans-operator interconnect services, including voice and data roaming. The pair have reportedly begun running live commercial voice traffic across multiple Asian operators using IPX Voice – one of several products designed and developed by Sybase 365. The vendor says its Sybase IPX 365 network will enable Globe Telecom to exchange international calls directly with other mobile operators rather than routing calls through traditional wholesale voice carriers.

Source: TeleGeography.

According to a report on the first half of 2010 by the Swedish Post and Telecom Agency (PTS), the volume of mobile outgoing call minutes overtook fixed minutes for the first time in the country during the period, with cellular calls accounting for 52% of the six-month total of 21.5 billion minutes, compared to 10% a decade ago.

Furthermore, one-third, or 1.5 million, of the approximately 4.5 million broadband internet subscriptions recorded by the PTS at mid-2010, was accounted for by mobile broadband services provided by cellular network operators. Elsewhere in the report, the number of fixed telephony subscriptions continued to fall to just over five million by the end of June 2010; of these around one million were based on IP telephony (VoIP). The regulator also said that IPTV subscribers reached 429,000 by mid-2010, out of a total of five million television subscriptions in the Swedish market overall.

Source: TeleGeography

The UAE’s Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) has published its licensing framework for the provision of voice-over-IP (VoIP), announcing that only the Sultanate’s four licensed telecoms operators – Etisalat, Du, and satellite companies Thuraya and Yahsat – will be allowed to offer the service. International companies, such as Skype, remain barred from providing internet telephony, although they have the option of joining forces with one of the four local operators to legally offer the service. Mohammed Gheyath, executive director at the TRA, commented: ‘The TRA believes that this regulatory policy will provide opportunities for both licensees and users to benefit from VoIP-based services in keeping with the market demands. The TRA looks forward to seeing the introduction of VoIP services that are responsive to consumer and business needs.’ Previously, Etisalat and Du were the only companies allowed to provide internal VoIP services within the UAE, which banned international internet-based calls in 2004. With the relevant infrastructure already in place, incumbent Etisalat has been able to immediately launch a VoIP service for enterprise customers.

Source: TeleGeography

The Zimbabwe Chronicle reports that eight companies have been granted licences to operate international voice-over-internet protocol (VoIP) telephony services.

Gideon Magodo of the Postal and Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe (POTRAZ) told the newspaper that the regulator had received applications from eleven organisations seeking Internet Access Provider Class A licences (allowing data, internet and VoIP services), including six new applications and five wishing to upgrade from Class B (data and internet only) to Class A concessions. Magodo said POTRAZ had granted new licences to Aquiva, Dandemutande and Taurai Zimbabwe while it had agreed to upgrade licences held by state-run incumbent telco TelOne (which owns ISP ComOne), data network operator Africom, ISP Ecoweb (owned by cellco Econet Wireless), Powertel, the telecoms wing of the state electricity utility, and ISP Telecontract. Regulations dictate that licensees must be at least 51% Zimbabwean-owned.

The watchdog announced earlier this week that it would now place a moratorium on issuing VoIP licences because the sector was ‘saturated.’ Until the recent licensing, companies were restricted to providing domestic IP-based services whilst international VoIP calls were not permitted, although it was previously reported that Africom was allowed to offer the service for corporate customers. Furthermore, it was reported that POTRAZ had approved an international calling card service from Econet which used an IP platform.

Source: Telegeography

­Landline and mobile telephony losses from VoIP are expected to exceed US$18.4 billion by 2014 in Latin America, reports local research house, Signals Telecom Consulting. Their report also expects that the regional FTTx market will record a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 31.64% in the number of homes passed in the 2009-2014 period. Launch of DOCSIS 3.0 services by CATV operators in Latin America will drive the deployment of VDSL and FTTx solutions.

Argentina, Brazil, Mexico and Venezuela account for over 88% of the Latin American VoIP market. Increased coverage by UMTS/HSPA networks and prospects for the arrival in the region of LTE networks will encourage landline operator investments intended to increase transmission speeds for their cabled broadband offerings.

New data from TeleGeography’s European VoIP & Triple Play Research Service reveal that voice over IP (VoIP) subscribers have grown from just over six million in 2005 to 34.6 million at year-end 2008. VoIP now accounts for more than 24% of fixed line telephone subscribers in Europe.

VoIP service revenues of EUR4.1 billion are still dwarfed by the nearly EUR36 billion generated by traditional switched fixed-line services. However, the impact of VoIP on the European fixed-line market is greater than its relatively modest subscriber and revenue share would suggest, due to the strong downward pressure VoIP-based competitors place on voice service prices.

Source: Telegeography

­At the end of 2008 the Polish VoIP telephony market was worth PLN 440 million (US$139 million), with CaTV operators having generated the largest share of revenue in the segment. In recent years also fixed-line operators have included VoIP services into their offer.

Source: Cellular News

Financial Times Deutschland reports that mobile operators Vodafone Germany and T-Mobile Deutschland may back down from their position that they would not sell Nokia handsets with the Voice-over-IP (VoIP) programme Skype included. The service currently allows users to make telephone calls for free, or more cheaply than traditional telephone providers. Both operators have said that they are looking into offering special tariffs for mobile VoIP use instead of blocking the services, which have been available for their mobile internet customers for six weeks.

According to TeleGeography’s CommsUpdate, T-Mobile announced in early April 2009 it would not allow its customers to use the new Skype application designed specifically for Apple’s iPhone. T-Mobile spokesperson, Alexander von Schmettow, said: ‘It is clearly stated in our customer contracts that such services may not be used. There are two reasons for this – because the high level of traffic would hinder our network performance, and because if the Skype programme didn’t work properly, customers would make us responsible for it.’

Source: TeleGeography.

Skype’s share of international long-distance traffic, 2008:

New data from TeleGeography show that international voice traffic continues to rise, despite the availability of an ever-broader range of substitutes for standard telephone calls. Cross-border telephone traffic grew 14% in 2007 and is estimated to have grown 12% in 2008, to 384 billion minutes. Due to declining call prices, however, revenues have largely been flat.

Source: TeleGeography.

The Korea Times reports that the country’s VoIP subscriber base passed the three million mark earlier this month, up from 2.5 million at the end of 2008. ‘With the improvement in number portability policies, the number of VoIP users will rise by an even faster clip after May,' said an official from the regulator, the Korea Communications Commission (KCC). Five million VoIP subscribers are expected by the end of 2009.

LG Dacom, which had only 336,000 traditional telephony users at the end of February, leads the VoIP market with 1.32 million subscribers, stretching its lead over Samsung Networks and KT Corp, who have around 400,000 each. Korea Cable Telecom (KCT) boasts 300,000 VoIP subscribers, while SK Broadband has just over 270,000.

KT Corp, the dominant traditional fixed line operator, has been reluctant in the past to commit to VoIP over concerns that PSTN to VoIP migration would result in a decline in overall ARPU. However, in the first two months of the year its PSTN customer base fell by more than 250,000 to 19.62 million, and its continued decline is thought to have finally convinced KT to embrace VoIP.

Source: TeleGeography.

Voice over IP telephony services are reshaping the fixed-line telecom market in Europe. By mid-year 2008, just under 30 million consumer VoIP lines were in service in Western Europe, up from 20 million only a year earlier. While the aggregate pace of growth across Europe remains rapid, trends vary dramatically by country.

• Market penetration at at mid-year 2008 ranged from slightly less than 50% of households in France to less than 3% in Spain.
• Growth rates ranged from an anemic 13% in Norway to 544% in Portugal.
• Incumbents lead the VoIP market in France, Italy, the U.K., the Netherlands and Norway, but competitive operators hold the lead in most other markets.
• Prices of triple-play bundles of broadband, VoIP, and video services range from €30 to more than €80 per month.

VoIP Penetration of Households, Q2 2007 & Q2 2008

TeleGeography’s European VoIP & Triple Play Research Service brings clarity to the state of this dynamic market. Contents include:

• VoIP subscriber, revenue and traffic data by country from 2004 to 2008.
• Subscriber and revenue projections by country through 2012.
• Rankings of Europe’s leading VoIP service providers.
• Detailed analysis of the VoIP markets in 13 European nations.
• Profiles of 72 leading consumer VoIP providers.
• Broadband and VoIP pricing summaries in 13 European nations.

All data are updated twice annually, and are current through mid-year 2008. Bi-annual updates, delivered in PDF and Excel spreadsheets, include country subscriber totals, provider rankings, VoIP projections by country and baseline market indicators by country.

Source: TeleGeography.

According to a study by the Finnish Communications Regulatory Authority (FICORA) over 68% of households in the country now have access to broadband services, up from 59% a year earlier. The survey conducted by the regulator also noted that over 80% of users believe that they need a connection speed of at least 1Mbps. Uptake of mobile broadband has reportedly seen a significant increase over the twelve-month period, with 11% of broadband users taking a mobile broadband subscription compared to just 1% last year; the survey indicated that most mobile broadband users also have a fixed line broadband service.
Despite the increase in broadband uptake less than a third of households in the country had a fixed line voice connection. In contrast the survey reported that 98% of 15-79-year olds had access to a mobile phone. VoIP calls also registered an increase over the period, with 24% of internet users indicating that they had used the technology in 2008, up from 21% in 2007.

Source: TeleGeography.

Eight domestic ISPs and one regional company have been given permission to offer voice-over-internet protocol (VoIP) calls in Serbia. Amongst the winners of permits were WiMAX network operator Verat, YUBC, Beotelnet, Informatika and INT CS.

Source: TeleGeography.

Slovenia's broadband penetration reached 19.5% at the end of the third quarter of 2008, up from 15.9% a year ago, with household penetration rising from 47% to 58% in the same period, according to the quarterly telecoms market report by the Agency for Post and Telecommunications (APEK). Incumbent telco Telekom Slovenije accounted for a 48.5% share of the high speed subscriber market, down from 51.5% at end-3Q 2007, and the country's largest alternative operator T-2 reached a share of 17.9%, up by 5.5 percentage points year-on-year. Direct fibre connections (FTTx) made up 9.4% of all broadband lines, compared to 2.1% a year earlier. APEK said that VoIP telephony subscribers reached 191,000 at the end of September 2008, up from 96,500 twelve months previously, and VoIP now accounts for 22% of the country's total fixed line subscriber base. Telekom Slovenije was reported to be the country's largest VoIP provider, with 45.5% of the market ahead of T-2 with 33%. Telekom's cellular subsidiary Mobitel remained the largest provider of mobile services by retail subscribers (figures including MVNOs), with 60.6% of the market, ahead of Austrian-owned Si.Mobil (27.3%), debitel (5.0%), Izimobil (2.5%), Tusmobil (4.4%) and T-2 (0.1%). IPTV subscribers in Slovenia rose by 150% year-on-year to 133,500 at end-September 2008, as cable TV viewers fell from 315,000 to 294,000 in the same period. Telekom Slovenije leads the IPTV segment, followed by T-2.

Source: TeleGeography.

About 8.5 million more U.S. households will start using Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) for their home phone service over the next two years, according to a new forecast from Pike & Fischer's Broadband Advisory Services.

The number of VoIP-connected households in the United States will approach 30 million by the end of the decade, generating more than $11 billion in revenue for cable operators, telephone companies and network-independent providers such as Skype, P&F predicts.

Source: Cellular News.

The cost of talking on the go is coming down, thanks to an increasing number of options for using Internet calling services on cellphones as an alternative to traditional cellular service plans.

Source: IHT.

Vancouver-based Corinex Communication, a provider of powerline and coaxial network solutions and products, has announced that it is to lead a project to provide internet access to rural villages in India. Using Broadband over Powerline (BPL) technology ten villages have been targeted in a deal believed to be worth more than USD17 million. It is anticipated that deployment will be completed within 18 months, providing web access and VoIP services to approximately 3,000 users. According to TeleGeography’s GlobalComms database broadband penetration in India stood at only 0.3% by the end of 2007.

Source: TeleGeography.

Spurred on by the explosive penetration of mobile telephony and broadband services, the Colombian telecommunication services market has witnessed high and stable growth rates in recent times. Market development, in the short and medium term, will depend a great deal on the promotion of new technologies and applications.

New analysis from Frost & Sullivan finds that the market earned revenues of over $5.48 billion in 2006 and estimates this to reach $7.12 billion in 2012.

"The primary drivers for the Colombian telecommunications markets include the strong growth of broadband services, the development of the VoIP market, and the emergence of new applications in the mobile telephony segment," notes Gina Sánchez, Research Analyst at Frost & Sullivan. "With fixed telephony services having reached maturity and mobile telephony penetration levels at over 73 percent, value-added services and new technologies will be critical to the market's future growth."

With regard to broadband and Internet access services, growth is likely to be accelerated by the country's economic progress, more affordable personal computers (PCs) and telecommunication equipment, and the Government's social programs for digital inclusion. Moreover, broadband prices continue to fall as a result of increasing competition and this continuing trend is likely to further spur subscriber growth.

Going forward, the voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) segment is likely to emerge as the fastest growing market segment, followed by the broadband and Internet access segment. During the forecast period, the VoIP segment is projected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 77.0 percent and the number of lines is expected to grow from 22,560 to 504,509.

"However, the entrance of multinational companies and the mergers and acquisitions adopted by market participants to strengthen their position have added much competition to the market," notes Sánchez. "In this scenario operators have started a price reduction race that may restrain market growth."

Overall, the Colombian telecommunications sector has emerged as a market with high and stable growth rates. Given the increasing competition and the overwhelming need to maintain healthy average revenue per user (ARPU), it will be vital for market participants to offer bundled solutions and triple play, as well as integrated packages of telecommunications and IT solutions.

Source: Cellular News.

Consumer VoIP subscriber growth continues to soar in Western Europe, reaching 21.7 million at mid-year 2007, up from 15.6 million only six months earlier. TeleGeography estimates that the ranks of European VoIP subscribers had grown to 28.9 million by year-end 2007.

While VoIP is often associated with competitive carriers and cable companies, many European incumbents have counterattacked by launching their own VoIP services, often with great success. France Telecom has emerged as by far the largest consumer VoIP provider in Europe, while BT, Telecom Italia, and KPN all rank among the top ten European VoIP operators.

As these rankings suggest, the European consumer VoIP market remains fragmented and highly diverse, featuring a wide range of provider types and business models. In some countries, incumbents dominate; in others, competitive carriers have gained the advantage. Similarly, VoIP adoption differs widely across nations. For example, 34 percent of all French households subscribe to VoIP, compared to only 11 percent in Germany.

Source: TeleGeography.