State of Mobile Networks: Italy(November 2016)

State of Mobile Networks: Italy (November 2016)

As Italy prepares for a major wave of telecom consolidation, OpenSignal is examining the country's mobile data networks one ﬁnal time before Wind and 3 merge into a single mega-operator. Drawing on 500 million measurements collected this summer and autumn, our second State of Mobile Networks report for Italy compares the 3G and 4G performance of the country's four major operators. We found that a combined Wind and 3 will have some catching up to do.

4G speeds in Italy are LTE availability is a REPORT FACTS impressive mixed bag

If Italy's networks stand out in one way it's in Italy clearly has two classes of operators when it connection speed. The slowest average 4G speeds comes to offering a consistent LTE signal. In our tests, OpenSignal measured were 19 Mbps, while the two operators, Vodafone and TIM, were able to fastest topped 34 Mbps. provide a 4G connection more than 65% of the time,

while the other two, 3 Italia and Wind had Report Location Italy availability scores lower than 40%. Data Sample Size 502,434,886

User Sample Size 44,810 Vodafone scores big in Turin leads in 4G Sample Period Jul 1st - Sep 30th 2016 all performance performance among categories major cities

Vodafone led in nearly all of our metrics, winning all In an analysis of Italy's four largest cities, we found of OpenSignal's speed and availability awards. 3G Turin had the edge on Rome, Naples and Milan in latency was the only category that Vodafone didn't both LTE speed and availability. Though all of the win outright, drawing with TIM for the prize. operators improved on their national scores in metro areas, Vodafone and TIM stood apart.

Overall Network Comparison

Download Speed: 4G Download Speed: 3G Download Speed: OverallLatency: 4G Latency: 3G Availability: 4G

3 ITA

TIM

Vodafone

Wind

THE OPENSIGNAL APP: TESTING NETWORK PERFORMANCE ON MILLIONS OF PHONES GLOBALLY

Our app continually runs tests to measure the real world experience users receive. Instead of relying on user-initiated or drive-test simulations, we are able to paint a holistic picture of network’s performance through our background tests and crowdsourcing techniques -- all the while protecting the privacy of our millions of active OpenSignal users. The app has been downloaded over 15 million times collecting billions of measurements.

Network Availability Comparison

3 ITA AVAILABILITY: 4G

TIM This metric shows the proportion of time LTE subscribers on each network have a 4G (LTE) connection available to them. It's a measure of Vodafone the proportion of time users have a 4G signal on a network rather than a measure of geographic or population coverage. Wind

0 % 13 % 26 % 39 % 52 % 75 %

Network Speed Comparison

3 ITA DOWNLOAD SPEED: 4G

TIM This metric shows the average download speed on each network on 4G (LTE) connections. Vodafone

Wind

0 Mbps 6 Mbps 12 Mbps 18 Mbps 24 Mbps 35 Mbps

3 ITA DOWNLOAD SPEED: 3G

TIM This metric shows the average download speed on each network on 3G connections.

Vodafone 6.77Mbps

Wind

0 Mbps 2 Mbps 4 Mbps 6 Mbps 8 Mbps 10 Mbps

3 ITA DOWNLOAD SPEED: OVERALL TIM This metric shows the average download speed experienced by a user across all of an Vodafone operator's networks. Overall speed doesn't just factor in 3G and LTE speeds, but also the availability of each network technology. Wind Operators with lower LTE coverage tend to have lower overall speeds because their customers spend much more time connected to 0 Mbps 4 Mbps 8 Mbps 12 Mbps 16 Mbps 20 Mbps 25 Mbps slower 3G networks.

Network Latency Comparison

3 ITA LATENCY: 4G

TIM This metric shows the average latency on each network on 4G (LTE) connections. Latency, measured in milliseconds, is the delay data Vodafone experiences as it travels between points in the network. A lower score in this metric is a sign of a more responsive network. Wind

0 ms 12 ms 24 ms 36 ms 48 ms 70 ms

3 ITA LATENCY: 3G

TIM This metric shows the average latency on each network on 3G connections. Latency, measured in milliseconds, is the delay data Vodafone experiences as it travels between points in the network. A lower score in this metric is a sign of a more responsive network. Wind

0 ms 17 ms 34 ms 51 ms 68 ms 85 ms 100 ms

Regional results

This chart shows the regional winners in each category OpenSignal measures. Click on the icons to see a more detailed graph showing each operator’s performance.

Availability: 4G Download Speed: 4G

Milan

Naples

Rome

Turin

Analysis METHODOLOGY NOTES

Italy's mobile sector is about to undergo a major transformation. European OpenSignal data is collected from antitrust authorities have given Wind and 3 Italia permission to merge, creating a regular consumer smartphones and single mobile provider bigger than both Telecom Italia Mobile and Vodafone. recorded under conditions of normal But instead of contracting the Italian mobile market will maintain its four-operator usage. As opposed to drive-test edge. Buying up assets from Wind and 3, French upstart Iliad will set up shop in data, which simulates the typical the country after changing France's competitive landscape with its ultra-low-cost user experience by using the same service provider Free Mobile. devices to measure network performance in a small number of Before all of those changes go into effect next year, OpenSignal has taken one locations, we take our last look at the mobile networking status quo in Italy to see how the current four measurements from millions of mobile operators line up in 3G and 4G performance. What we found was a smartphones owned by normal country that is clearly accustomed to seeing fast 4G speeds from all of its service people who have downloaded the providers. But when it comes to network availability there is a deﬁnite divide OpenSignal app. between the bigger and smaller operators in their ability to deliver a 4G signal consistently. In particular, Vodafone set itself apart in our analysis, scoring highest in ﬁve of the six categories we measured. Those measurements are taken wherever users happen to be, Drawing on 500 million measurements collected by more than 44,000 whether indoors or out, in a city or OpenSignal smartphone users between July and September, our State of Mobile in the countryside, representing Networks report for Italy compares the 3G and 4G performance of TIM, performance the way users Vodafone, Wind and 3. Since publishing our last Italy report in May, experience it. For more information OpenSignal made some adjustments to both the way we collect data from our on how we collect and analyze our smartphone apps and the methodology we use to parse that data. The update data see our methodology page. allows us to make more measurements, examine new types of network metrics and hone the precision of the measurements we've always collected, helping us For this particular report, isolate the typical consumer mobile experience more effectively (for more details, 502,434,886 datapoints were see our recent blog post). The changes haven't affected our overall rankings of collected from 44,810 users during networks in Italy or around the world, but for sake of analytical rigor we aren't the period: Jul 1st - Sep 30th 2016 making any direct comparisons between results collected from the two different methodologies. All data has been collected from This report also examines the regional performance of all four operators in the users of the OpenSignal mobile app country's four largest cities: Rome, Milan, Naples and Turin. Before we dive into for Android or iOS. that city data, though, let's see how the operators measured up countrywide.

For every metric we've calculated Vodafone leads the way the statistical conﬁdence interval and plotted this on all of the graphs. When conﬁdence intervals overlap On a national level, Vodafone dominated our awards table and particularly for a certain metric we can't actually excelled in providing speedy mobile data connections. We tested the fastest 4G be sure which of the overlapping download speeds (34.3 Mbps) and the fastest 3G download speeds (6.8 operators has the best performance. Mbps) on Vodafone's networks. Those results, along with its high LTE availability, led to Vodafone handily winning our overall speed metric, which calculates the typical download speed consumers experience over an operator's combined 3G For this reason some metrics have and 4G networks. Vodafone delivered an overall average connection speed of multiple operator winners when 21.3 Mbps, according to our measurements, 7 Mbps faster than its closest rival. we've judged that the data is too close to call a victory. Though Vodafone was the standout in our speed metrics, the other operators were by no means slow. The lowest average 4G speed we measured was 18.9 Mbps on Wind's LTE network, while both TIM and 3 pushed past the 20 Mbps barrier in our tests. In addition, our users also were able to connect to all three operators' 3G networks at speeds exceeding 5 Mbps. In most countries, those 4G speeds in particular would be considered quite good, but in Italy's case, Vodafone has managed to set a higher bar.

In terms of 4G availability, Vodafone again took the prize for providing the most consistently available 4G signal in our tests, but it faced stiffer competition in this category from TIM. Rather than measure geographic coverage, our availability metric tracks the proportion of time users can connect to a particular network. In Vodafone's case, our users were able to see a Vodafone LTE signal 71.6% of the time and a TIM LTE signal 68.1% of the time.

Both Vodafone and TIM were far ahead of 3 and Vodafone, neither of which provided our testers with an LTE connection more than 40% of the time. In fact, Italy's operators appear to have split themselves into two distinct camps when it comes to making LTE connections accessible. While Vodafone and TIM are keeping pace with most of Europe in LTE availability, Wind and 3's availability scores rank lower than operators in many countries in the early stages of their LTE rollouts, according to our tests.

Those low availability scores drove down both operators' overall speed measurements despite both rating highly in our 4G speed tests. Our analysis found 3 and Wind's overall download speeds — 10.6 Mbps and 9 Mbps respectively — to be half that of the LTE speeds we measured on their networks. Since our users were able to connect to the two operators' LTE networks less than 40% of the time, our testers more often than not were faced with slower 3G links.

The ﬁnal metric we looked at was latency, which measures the response time of the network. Networks with lower latency react faster when a user clicks on a link or uses a real-time communications app. While Vodafone won our 4G latency award, it drew with TIM for best 3G latency in our tests.

A 4G boost in the big metro areas

OpenSignal took a deeper dive into 4G performance in Italy's four largest cities, and we found that all of the operators generally scored higher in network availability and speed in big urban areas than nationally — in some instances much higher.

Vodafone may have bested its competitors in our nationwide 4G availability metric, but it wasn't quite as dominant on the regional level. In Turin, TIM won our 4G availability award outright as our testers were able to ﬁnd a TIM 4G connection an impressive 85.5% of the time. In Milan, Naples and Rome, TIM and Vodafone were practically deadlocked, tying for best 4G availability in our analysis in all three cases. In all four cities, both operators were able to provide a 4G connection more than 70% of the time.

Though Wind and 3 still brought up the rear in our city 4G availability tests, they both improved signiﬁcantly on their national scores. In Milan and Naples, we were able to detect a 4G signal from both operators more than 40% of the time, and in Rome and Turin, we saw 4G signals from the two providers well over 50% of the time.

When we looked at 4G speed in the four cities, Turin clearly stood out. Three of the four operators saw sizable bumps in their national speed measurements in the Piedmont capital, though none more than Vodafone, which averaged 4G download speeds at an astonishingly high 50.6 Mbps in our tests. In addition, we measured average speeds of 41.2 Mbps on TIM's LTE network in Turin, which was close to doubling its national 4G speed rating.

We recorded notable speed boosts in Milan as well, while in Rome 4G speed generally matched national performance. Naples was the only city where we measured speeds lower than the nationwide trend. Vodafone also managed to extend its national 4G speed dominance on the regional level. We measured the fastest LTE speeds on Vodafone's networks in Milan and Rome as well as Turin. Naples was the only city of the four where other operators contested its speed crown. There we recorded a three-way draw between Vodafone, TIM and 3.

Vodafone nearly swept our awards in Italy, and our results show both it and TIM have some big performance advantages over 3 and Wind. By the time our next State of Mobile Networks report comes out though, we'll be looking at a very different mobile landscape. On Jan. 1, the combined Wind and 3 will launch service as Italy's new largest operator in terms of subscribers, and at some point next year we'll get a ﬁrst glimpse of Iliad's new low-cost Italian operator. Whether either of these two operators will present an immediate threat to Vodafone or TIM in network performance remains to be seen.