The report "The Communications Sector 2022”, regularly produced and published by ANACOM, characterises the electronic and postal communications sector in 2022 and explains its development throughout the year.
In 2022, there was an increase in the penetration rate of services provided at a fixed location, including fixed broadband (+1.5 percentage points), subscription TV signal distribution service (+1.3 percentage points) and the fixed telephone service (+1.1 percentage points). Considering only the residential segment, the penetration rates of FTS and TVS stand out with 96 accesses per 100 families, followed by FBB with 91 accesses per 100 families. This is according to the information reported by the providers and the demographic data of INE - Instituto Nacional de Estatística (Statistics Portugal). The increase in the penetration of fixed services was due to the growing take-up of bundled services, with a penetration rate of 91.4 per 100 households, 2.2 percentage points more than in 2021.
In the case of mobile services, penetration of the mobile telephone service (MTS) increased by 6.1 percentage points and MBB penetration increased by 7.0 percentage points, comprising access via mobile phone. The Digital School Programme, the resumption of economic activity following the pandemic and the growth of tourism in Portugal boosted the increase in mobile accesses, with growth exceeding the average of the last five years.
The pre-COVID-19 trend resumed in most categories of electronic communications traffic Although average monthly fixed and mobile voice traffic per access and text message traffic per access decreased compared to 2021, average monthly Internet traffic per access reached new all-time highs in 2022, both fixed broadband (FBB) and mobile broadband (MBB), due to the increased intensity in the use of services and the increase in the number of users. On average, each FBB access generated 250 GB per month (+4.4% compared to 2021). MBB monthly traffic per user reached 7.7 GB (+31.2%).
Use of over-the-top services (OTT) continued to increase, albeit less sharply compared to the pandemic period. The percentage of individuals who made voice or video calls over the Internet or who used instant messaging increased by 3 percentage points in 2022, while the use of video streaming on demand increased by 9 percentage points between 2020 and 2022.
Traffic from Roaming, which saw significant reductions as a result of international travel restrictions during the pandemic, increased significantly from 2nd quarter 2021 with the lifting of travel restrictions, while roaming out Internet traffic reached the highest level ever recorded for this indicator in 3rd quarter 2022.
In 2022, postal traffic per capita was reported at 54.3 items per inhabitant (56.7 in 2021). Postal traffic decreased by 4.2% compared to 2021, falling to 563 million items. Traffic from correspondence and editorial mail decreased by 5.8% and 4.6%, respectively, while direct mail traffic increased by 4.1%.
Parcel traffic, which has increased by 59.7% since 2018, continued to grow, albeit at a slower pace (+1.7% in 2022), and reached a new all-time high. Likewise, e-commerce continued to increase, albeit less significantly compared to the pandemic period. In 2022, 43% of individuals made purchases via the Internet in the three months prior to the survey (an increase of 2 percentage points compared to 2021). As a proportion of total traffic, parcel traffic made up 12.5% (increasing 0.7 percentage points from 2021.
In terms of revenues, in 2022, retail revenues from the main electronic communications services totalled 3.78 billion euros, with an increase of 3.5% compared to 2021. Revenues from postal services totalled around 709 million euros. Compared to the previous year, these revenues decreased by 0.6% and revenue per postal item increased by 3.8%.
MEO had the highest share of fixed voice subscribers - FTS (45.0%), subscription TV signal distribution service - TVS (41.1%), fixed Internet (40.9%), and mobile telephone services - MTS (39.0%). Grupo NOS held the second highest share in TVS (37.0%), FBB (34.0%) and FTS (32.5%) and the third highest in MTS (28.6%). Vodafone was the second largest MTS provider (28.9%) and the third largest provider of electronic communications services at a fixed location (21.7% of FBB, 19.3% of FTS and 18.8% in TVS). NOWO's shares were 2.9% in TVS and FBB, 2.3% in FTS and 2.0% in MTS. CTT's share of postal services reached 85.1%.
The publication is divided into 10 chapters: summary of electronic communications; coverage of electronic communications networks; offers of electronic communications services; the consumer of electronic communications; service bundles; Internet access service at a fixed location (including consumption of over-the-top services and the use of IoT equipment); television; telephone service at a fixed location and nomadic VoIP; mobile services; and postal services (including e-commerce).
Consult:
- O Sector das Comunicações 2022 https://www.anacom.pt/render.jsp?contentId=1743684
See also:
- Statistical Appendix of the Communications Sector in 2022 https://www.anacom.pt/render.jsp?contentId=1744133