As at the end of 1st Quarter 2011 (1Q11), there were about 2.13 million customers in Portugal with fixed Internet access, of which 2.1 million were broadband. At the same time, mobile broadband Internet had about 2.6 million actual users, of which over 1.2 million used cards/modem.
The number of customers with fixed Internet access increased by 1.4 percent over the previous quarter and by 8.4 percent over the first quarter of 2010. The majority of customers (98.7 percent) used broadband, which gained 31,500 customers over the quarter being reported, representing a growth rate of 1.5 percent over the previous quarter. Compared to the same quarter of 2010, the number of customers increased by about 8.8 percent. The number of customers with dial-up access continued to decline, dropping to 28,000, 5.1 percent less than in the previous quarter.
Looking at fixed broadband internet access technologies, ADSL remains the main technology (50.6 percent of the total), but there are signs over the last 3 consecutive quarters that ADSL use is stalling with a decline reported in the last quarter of 0.3 percent. Meanwhile, cable modem is used by 41.1 percent of fixed broadband customers, representing 40 percent of new subscriptions (in net terms) during 1Q11, and optical fibre (FTTH/B) represents about 7.2 percent of broadband customers, having grown 16.7 percent compared to the previous quarter. In 1Q11, six out of ten new broadband customers (in net terms) adopted this technology. Other technologies, including offers based on leased lines and FWA, represent only 1.1 percent of total customers, falling 2.3 percent from the previous quarter.
In terms of fixed broadband market share, Grupo PT had a market share of 47.2 per cent of customers, 0.4 percentage points higher than in the previous quarter and increasing by about 7 percentage points since the spin-off PT Multimédia. Grupo ZON's share of customers rose to 33.1 percent, with an increase of 0.1 percentage points over the previous quarter and 0.6 percentage points over the same period of 2010.
In terms of the mobile broadband access via card/modem, TMN is reported as having a 45 percent share of customers, followed by Optimus and Vodafone with 29.1 and 22.3 percent, respectively.
Meanwhile, each customer using broadband at a fixed location generated 26.8 GB of traffic on average per month, in line with the previous quarter.
Data from 1Q11 also indicates a broadband Internet access penetration rate of 19.8 per 100 inhabitants for fixed access and 24.4 per 100 inhabitants for mobile access with actual use. In the case of fixed access, this figure increased 0.3 percentage points over the previous quarter and by 1.6 percentage points over the same period of 2010. Penetration of fixed Internet offers supported over FTTH/B was reported at 1.4 per 100 inhabitants.
Consult the statistical report:
- Internet Access Service - 1st quarter 2011 https://www.anacom.pt/render.jsp?contentId=1093618
