Market Report, "United Kingdom Telecommunications Report Q2 2014", published

From: Fast Market Research, Inc.
Published: Thu May 01 2014


The UK telecoms market is mature with a high penetration of all services, and a roll-out of next generation services including fibre and LTE services is in progress. As a result of its maturity the UK market has diminished opportunities for subscription growth, and operator strategies reflect this by increasingly focusing on value generation from subscriptions. In the mobile market this means operators are focused on rolling out LTE, with three networks operational from the end of August 2013, as well as VAS such as mobile advertising and payments. Meanwhile, in the fixed broadband sector, operators continue to target the converged services market through the provision of triple- and quad-play packages, with BSkyB the outperformer in this area since 2010, but BT remains the market leader in fixed-line and broadband services.

Key Data

* The mobile market is mature with limited subscription growth prospects, with penetration of 123% at YE13.
* Smartphone penetration has continued to rise, with operator data showing it reached around 55% by the end of 2013, creating opportunities for operators to market VAS.
* The residential and small business fixed broadband market climbed by 5.4% in 2012, with a bias towards higher speed technologies such as cable and fibre, according to data from the telecoms regulator Ofcom.

Full Report Details at
- http://www.fastmr.com/prod/799947_united_kingdom_telecommunications_report_q2_2014.aspx?afid=301

Key Trends And Developments

The refinement of operator LTE strategies was again the dominant theme in the UK telecoms market in the past quarter. The most notable developments were from the smallest operator Three, which signed a deal with LTE-first mover Everything Everywhere (EE) to share LTE network infrastructure. The deal, worth GBP1bn was signed in February 2014, and is passive, meaning the companies will share mast infrastructure and backhaul transmission, but antennas and base stations are company-owned and maintained. This will allow the two companies to maintain differentiated services. Operators are competing with each other to broaden the reach of their services as LTE uptake outperforms expectations, with EE reported 2mn LTE subscriptions by the end of 2013 - double its initial target of 1mn.

One beneficiary of the mobile operator race to improve LTE services has been Virgin Media. The leading cable operator has been able to utilise extra network capacity by providing backhaul to operators, improving its operational efficiency. In February 2014 Three signed a five year multi-million pound deal to utilise Virgin Media Business' nationwide fibre-optic network. The deal follows another signed by Virgin with O2 in July 2013 for 10-years of backhaul provision. Both mobile operators lack wireline infrastructure, so the deal with Virgin alleviates a potential bottleneck for 4G speeds that could have left them at a competitive disadvantage versus rivals.

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