Fixed telephone service (FTS) penetration rate in Portugal reached 46.3 accesses per 100 inhabitants in 2016, 1 percentage point more than in the previous year. This is the highest penetration rate since ANACOM started compiling this information. At the end of the year there were 4.79 million fixed telephone lines.
This growth of penetration of the fixed telephone service was mainly due to an increase of 16.9% in the number of telephone lines based on optical fibre networks and cable TV (another 331,000 accesses in 2016) and a rise of 2.3% in GSM/UMTS/LTE accesses (another 11,000 accesses), which more than compensated for the reduction in other types of access (analogue and ISDN).
It should be noted that around 90% of fixed telephone service customers have the service as part of their bundled offers.
In 2016, there was a reduction in voice traffic in minutes (less 11%), which translated into a reduction of monthly average traffic access (less 12.9%). This trend is due to the increase in the penetration of quadruple/quintuple play (4P/5P) bundles, which include mobile services with free calls to all networks and, also, to the growing penetration of new forms of supported communication on the Internet.
In terms of market shares, at the end of 2016 MEO had 46.5% of total accesses and 43.5% of direct access customers, and this was the first year that MEO had a share of less than 50% in terms of accesses. The NOS Group had a share of 34.7% in terms of accesses and 37.6% in terms of direct customers, and was the provider that, in net terms, had the largest number of installed accesses in 2016. Vodafone, with shares of 14.5% in terms of accesses and 14.6% in terms of customers, was the company which, in net terms, attracted more customers.
Total revenues from the service (individualized and revenues from bundles) rose to €1.96 billion, an increase of 6.9% compared to 2015. If only the individualized revenue of the fixed telephone service is considered, it can be seen that these decreased 13.8% over the equivalent period.
Consult the statistical report:
- Telephone service at a fixed location and nomadic VOIP - 2016 https://www.anacom.pt/render.jsp?contentId=1409255
