State Of Play - Internet Access Markets In Asia-Pacific

I managed to get my hands on a few reports on Internet Access markets in Asia-Pacific, which I think is a very important indicator for the future of the region. I shall try to consolidate the salient points. The Internet access market consists of the total revenues generated by Internet Service Providers (ISPs) from the provision of narrow band and broadband Internet connections to Internet subscribers. Asia-Pacific comprises Australia, China, Japan, India, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan.

The Asia-Pacific internet access market generated total revenues of $69.4 billion in 2008, representing a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 21.7% for the period spanning 2004-2008. The number of internet subscribers increased with a CAGR of 14% between 2004-2008, to reach a total of 151.9 million in 2008. The performance of the market is forecast to decelerate, with an anticipated CAGR of 14.2% for the five-year period 2008-2013, which is expected to drive the market to a value of $135 billion by the end of 2013.

The Asia-Pacific internet access market generated total revenues of $69.4 billion in 2008, representing a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 21.7% for the period spanning 2004-2008. In comparison, the Americas and European markets grew with CAGRs of 10.7% and 12.8%, respectively, over the same period, to reach respective values of $64 billion and $51.4 billion in 2008. The number of internet subscribers increased with a CAGR of 14% between 2004- 2008, to reach a total of 151.9 million in 2008. The number of subscribers is expected to rise to 253.9 million by the end of 2013, representing a CAGR of 10.8% for the 2008-2013 period.

The performance of the market is forecast to decelerate, with an anticipated CAGR of 14.2% for the five-year period 2008-2013, which is expected to drive the market to a value of $135 billion by the end of 2013. Comparatively, the Americas and European markets will grow with CAGRs of 8% and 6.4%, respectively, over the same period, to reach respective values of $93.8 billion and $70 billion in 2013.

The 3 biggest and leading players for Internet Access in Asia-Pacific are:

1) China Telecom - China Telecom has a single operating segment: wireline. It provides wireline telecommunication services, wireline internet, value added services, managed data services, and leased line services to residential, government and business customers. The company primarily operates in China. The company is headquartered in Beijing, China and has around 285,105 employees. The company provides telecommunications services in 20 provinces of China including Shanghai municipality, Guangdong, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Anhui, Fujian, Jiangxi, Chongqing municipality, Sichuan, Hubei, Hunan, Hainan, Shaanxi, Gansu, Qinghai, Ningxia, Hui autonomous region, and Xinjiang.

The wireline telephone services of the company include local, long distance, and interconnection services. China Telecom had 220 million local telephone subscribers towards the end of 2007. China Telecom offers primary internet access services to residential and medium enterprise customers. It provides broadband services to business and residential customers through fiber optic networks. The company had about 35 million broadband subscribers at the end of FY2007.

China Telecom offers managed data services such as digital data network services, which enable data transmission at 64 Kbps to 2 Mbps and serves small and medium enterprise customers. It also offers frame relay or Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) services. ATM technology supports high speed data transfers.

2) KT Freetel - KT Freetel Co. (KTF) is a mobile communication company. The company's activities include the provision of code division multiple access (CDMA) engineering consulting services, wireless data telecommunication solutions, technology-related training and consulting services. The company also provides wideband CDMA (WCDMA) services under the brand name 'SHOW'. The company operates in South Korea where it is headquartered in Songpa Gu, Seoul, and employs about 2,555 people. The company is involved in various activities that include: the provision of code division multiple access (CDMA) engineering consulting services, including the planning and design of wired and wireless networks, network installation and testing, and network maintenance and optimization; the provision of wireless data telecommunication solutions, such as mobile data services based on short message service (SMS), wired and wireless integrated telecommunication services and multipack services based on CDMA, and the provision of technology-related training and consulting services. The company also provides WCDMA (wideband code division multiple access CDMA) services under the brand name 'SHOW'.

3) NTT - Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation (NTT) is a Japan-based telecommunications provider. The company operates through wholly owned subsidiaries, Nippon Telegraph and Telephone East Corporation (NTT East), and Nippon Telegraph and Telephone West Corporation (NTT West), which have monopolies in their markets; the long distance carrier NTT Communications Corporation (NTT Communications); mobile carrier NTT DoCoMo; NTT Data and various other subsidiaries. The company primarily operates in Japan. It is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan and employs about 193,831 people.

The company's long distance and international communications segment offers international communications services and related ancillary services. IP/packet communications services handled by the long distance and international communications business include OCN, IP-VPN and frame relay. Under the mobile communications segment, the company operates thorough NTT DoCoMo Group in Japan. NTT DoCoMo is 65.3% owned by NTT.

The company offers its third generation (3G) services through FOMA (Freedom of Mobile multimedia Access) over Wide Code Division Multiple Access (W-CDMA standard). IP/packet communications services handled by the mobile communications business segment include i-mode. i-mode service is a wireless, packet-based Internet-access service using a system that transmits information that has been divided into blocks called packets.

The Future

By the year 2013, the Asia-Pacific internet access market is forecast to have a value of $135 billion, an increase of 94.6% from 2008. The compound annual growth rate of the market in the period 2008-2013 is predicted to be 14.2%.

In terms of subscribers, by the year 2013, the Asia-Pacific internet access market is forecast to have 253.9 million internet subscribers, an increase of 67.2% from 2008. The compound annual growth rate of the market volume in the period 2008-2013 is predicted to be 10.8%.


p/s photos: Sheila Majid (over the years)