Serbia Telecommunications Report 2011

The Serbia Telecommunications Report provides industry professionals and strategists, corporate analysts, telecommunication associations, government departments and regulatory bodies with independent forecasts and competitive intelligence on Serbia's telecommunications industry.

The 2011 report on Serbia's telecoms market contains updated and extended forecasts that predict how the country's fixed-line, internet, broadband and mobile sectors will develop through to the end of 2015. The new forecasts reflect 2009 data published by Serbia's fixed-line incumbent operator Telekom Serbia and by the Serbian telecoms regulator RATEL. These forecasts and analysis as well incorporate data published by the country's three mobile operators, MTS, Telekom Serbia's mobile business; Telenor Serbia, which is wholly owned by the Norwegian telecoms company Telenor; and Mobilkom Serbia, a subsidiary of Telekom Austria.

The newly revised

The newly revised and extended mobile subscriber forecast for Serbia envisages relatively flat growth over the then few years. The author estimates that 3G clients accounted for over 9.6% of the mobile market at the end of 2010; this was up from 7.7% at the end of 2009. BMI suspects that a weak economic climate was a major contributory factor in dampening 3G subscriber growth in 2010. However, the author is optimistic about the future expansion of the 3G market segment. One development which should benefit long-term 3G growth is the deployment and expansion of higher-speeds to HSPA innovation; this development will furthermore stimulate the proliferation of mobile data and video services.

In the wireline sector, recent months have seen several developments which should ultimately result in increased competition in the fixed-line telephony market. In May 2009, the regulator issued a licence to provide fixed wireless services to the ISP Media Works. Next in January 2010, the regulator awarded the country's second fixed-line telephony licence to Telenor Serbia. Though Telenor Serbia at first aimed to lease Telekom Serbia's infrastructure in order to provide fixed-line services, talks between Telenor and Telekom Serbia subsequently became deadlocked. Since at that time, the regulator has become involved in setting the terms and price at which Telekom Serbia will lease its infrastructure to Telenor. At that time of writing nevertheless, Telenor Serbia had but to officially launch commercial fixed-line services. Serbia's telecoms regulator suggests that the number of fixed-line telephony connections grew by just 0.7% in 2009 to reach 3.1mn. Slow fixed-line growth compared with the previous year reflects the competition which Telekom Serbia is experiencing from alternative communications services, including mobile telephony and VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol). BMI believes that Serbia's fixed-line sector experienced negative growth in 2010. By the end of the year, the author believes that Serbia's fixed-line penetration rate had fallen to around 41%.

Meanwhile, according to the regulator, the number of Serbian broadband connections increased by 52.5% in 2009 to reach 792,000; this is equivalent to a penetration rate of 10.8%. The publisher estimates that growth of nearly 33% in 2010 helped to raise the penetration rate to over 14% by the end of the year. One of the most significant developments in recent months has been the growth of the mobile broadband segment.

However, growth in demand for DSL and cable-based broadband services as well remains strong. Serbia sits in 14th position in BMIs Business Environment Ratings for Central and Eastern Europe. The country scores below the regional average in all of the categories surveyed.