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Saudi Arabia Telecommunications Report Q4 2011
Business Monitor International, Nov 2011, Pages: 88
Just as we did in the previous quarter, BMI's latest Saudi Arabia telecoms market report contains analysis and forecasts for the mobile, fixed-line and broadband sectors of the market using the latest data published by the Communications and Information technology Commission (CITC) and some of the country's telecoms service providers. It also contains our maiden mobile ARPU forecast for the Saudi Arabia market based on the weighted average of ARPUs published by the mobile operators.
At the end of March 2010 there were 53.3mn subscribers in the Saudi mobile market, according to market data published by the CITC. This reflected growth rates of 3.3% q-o-q and 16.1% y-o-y. It also showed large net additions of 1.7mn subscribers, compared with 1.1mn in Q110. Saudi Arabia's mobile subscriber base at the end of Q111 brings mobile penetration to 200%. Although impressive subscriber growth in Q410 and Q111 suggest continued subscriber growth, BMI takes a cautious view of future growth considering the shift in focus by operators on higher value subscriptions and the likelihood of the disconnection of inactive SIMs. BMI does not expect this strong growth to continue and there will be a considerable decline in growth over the remainder of our forecast period to 2015.
Saudi Arabia's highly developed market means operators are targeting revenue growth through mobile content and mobile broadband. The latter service, in BMI's opinion, is particularly suited to Saudi Arabia, allowing for rapid roll-outs across the country, particularly where the terrain is less than hospitable. BMI expects mobile broadband to boost 3G connections and the wider broadband market, bringing more of the population online.
Increasingly, Saudi subscribers will aim to upgrade their existing connections from 2G to 3G, providing real growth in the market. For operators, this creates an opportunity to boost revenues by encouraging greater data usage and the abundance of smartphones available in the market will drive this. Meanwhile, Mobily intends to launch commercial LTE services in November 2011, which BMI expects will hit data usage in Saudi Arabia.
In the fixed-line market, Q111 market data published by the CITC show an uptick in fixed-line subscriptions during the first three months of 2011. This confirms BMI's view in our previous report that subscriber numbers will rise slowly from demand for multiplay services. By the end of our forecast period in 2015 the penetration rate will have declined, to more than 15%. The rate of growth will be so slow that population growth will overtake it, pushing down the penetration. Fixed-line service providers will increasingly rely on broadband to drive revenues in future, catering to subscriber demand for internet and data services.
Business Monitor International's Saudi Arabia Telecommunications Report provides industry professionals and strategists, corporate analysts, telecommunication associations, government departments and regulatory bodies with independent forecasts and competitive intelligence on Saudi Arabia's telecommunications industry.
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