RTR INTERNET MONITOR 2018 Annual Report www.rtr.at 2018 Austrian Regulatory Authority for Broadcasting and Telecommunications (Rundfunk und Telekom Regulierungs-GmbH) Mariahilfer Strasse 77–79, 1060 Vienna, Austria Tel.: +43 (0)1 58058-0; fax: +43 (0)1 58058-9191; e-mail: [email protected] web: www.rtr.at RTR INTERNET MONITOR 2018 Annual Report 2018 Contents Contents RTR Internet Monitor 2018 Annual Report Preface 5 1 Broadband in Austria 7 Fixed and mobile broadband connections 8 Broadband penetration 9 Fixed and mobile data volume – retail market 10 Fixed and mobile data volume per connection 11 Broadband revenues 12 Tables 13 2 Fixed broadband 17 Retail fixed broadband by infrastructure 18 Retail fixed broadband by customer category 19 Retail broadband connections by bandwidth category – fixed network 20 Retail broadband connections by bundle category – fixed network 21 Revenues from retail broadband connections – fixed network 22 Wholesale broadband products offered by A1 Telekom Austria AG 23 Tables 24 3 Mobile broadband 27 Active mobile broadband connections – retail 28 Active mobile broadband connections by customer category 29 Retail data volumes in mobile networks 30 Tables 31 4 Broatband prices 33 Hedonic price index for broadband 34 Price baskets for fixed broadband – with and without TV 35 Price baskets for mobile broadband – limited data volumes 36 Price baskets for mobile broadband – unlimited data volumes 37 Price baskets: fixed vs. mobile broadband 38 Tables 39 RTR Internet Monitor 2018 Annual Report Contents 5 Monitoring internet access quality 43 RTR-NetTest 44 Download and upload speeds (all technologies) 45 Download speed by bandwidth category 46 Download speed by technology 47 Upload speed by technology 48 Number of tests for each technology 49 Median download speed – off-peak and peak 50 Download and upload speeds by time of day 51 Download speed by region 52 Ping time (latency) 53 Tables 54 6 Explanatory notes and Glossary 59 Explanatory notes on data sources 60 Glossary 61 Publishing information 64 RTR Internet Monitor 2018 Annual Report RTR Internet Monitor 2018 Annual Report Preface Preface Dear readers, the internet is a fact of life: we wonder how we ever managed without it. Internet users worldwide numbered almost four billion in 2018, according to various statistics. Smartphones are nowadays seen as the main devices for quickly and easily accessing the internet, whether for business or personal reasons, on the go or at home. While at the end of 2018 smartphone plans used to access the internet totalled roughly 5.7 million, outnumbering fixed broadband lines by more than double, demand for high- speed broadband connections continued to climb nonetheless, with lines supporting ≥100 Mbps representing more than 11% of total fixed broadband connections. Data usage is gathering momentum from quarter to quarter, both in the mobile and fixed network segments. A total of 433,550 terabytes were consumed via mobile networks in Q4 2018, 17.3% more than in Q3 2018, and 855,575 terabytes via fixed networks, which is an increase of 8.5% from the previous quarter. In Austria, the need for increasingly faster internet access to serve the economy and society is clearly growing. To reliably meet this need, in the long run there is no alternative to stepping up the rollout of fixed and mobile fibre networks. As a regulatory authority, we will gladly do everything in our power to support the public sector in moving Austria forward towards a position at the forefront of the information society. The RTR Internet Monitor series, founded last year, is our way of recognising the tremendous significance of the internet and the general public’s interest in this phenomenon. In this publication, we provide a summary of the Austrian broadband market as well as details of the fixed network and mobile access technologies, while pointing out trends based on the indexes we have calculated. The final section presents evaluations based on the RTR-NetTest, our tool for testing internet speed and quality. As is fitting for the medium of the internet, we make the RTR Internet Monitor available in PDF and e-paper form, while the data can be viewed in the Open Data zone or as interactive charts. We hope this report makes interesting reading for you. Johannes Gungl Managing Director Vienna Telecommunications and Postal Services Division June 2019 RTR RTR Internet Monitor 2018 Annual Report www.rtr.at 01 Broadband in Austria 1 Broadband in Austria 7 Fixed and mobile broadband connections 8 Broadband penetration 9 Fixed and mobile data volume – retail market 10 Fixed and mobile data volume per connection 11 Broadband revenues 12 Tables 13 Section 1 Broadband in Austria Fixed and mobile broadband connections Smartphone subscriptions increase by roughly 3% in Q4 2018 Fixed broadband Mobile data subscriptions Smartphone subscriptions in thousands 12,000 10,000 8,000 6,000 4,223 4,282 4,339 4,661 4,780 4,819 4,909 5,478 5,492 5,472 5,486 5,658 4,000 2,417 2,462 2,404 2,464 2,451 2,453 2,462 2,220 2,156 2,140 2,153 2,162 2,000 2,479 2,488 2,494 2,524 2,528 2,516 2,506 2,511 2,512 2,523 2,514 2,521 0 Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 2016 2016 2016 2016 2017 2017 2017 2017 2018 2018 2018 2019 • At the end of 2018, there were around 10.3 million broadband The chart above shows the total number of connections in Austria, which was somewhat more than in the fixed and mobile broadband connections. previous quarter (+1.8%). Fixed broadband connections include both those based on provider-owned infrastructure • Fixed broadband connections rose slightly in number by 0.3% to a and unbundled lines, as well as those total of 2.52 million. purchased in the wholesale market. Within mobile broadband, a distinction is • Mobile data subscriptions totalled 2.16 million after a marginal made between mobile data subscriptions increase of 0.4%. (with or without data volumes included) and smartphone subscriptions. M2M SIM cards are • Smartphone subscriptions showed the most substantial growth. not shown in the chart. These totalled roughly 5.66 million at the end of 2018, which The term ‘broadband connections’ is defined in represents a 3.1% jump from the previous quarter and is 3.3% the Glossary at the end of the report. more than at the end of 2017. Such tariff plans accounted for over half of the broadband connections shown here (54.7%). 8 RTR Internet Monitor 2018 Annual Report Section 1 Broadband in Austria Broadband penetration More smartphones but no change in fixed and mobile broadband connections compared year-on-year Fixed broadband Mobile data subscriptions Smartphone subscriptions Percentage of households 200% 150% 141.9% 100% 63.2% 54.2% 50% 0% Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 2016 2016 2016 2016 2017 2017 2017 2017 2018 2018 2018 2018 Source for number of households: Statistics Austria • The fixed broadband penetration rate showed a marginal increase Broadband penetration refers to the ratio of of 1.1 percentage points in the fourth quarter of 2018. This meant fixed and mobile broadband connections to that 63.2% of households had fixed lines. the total number of households in Austria. The penetration rate also takes into account • As previously, smartphone subscriptions showed the highest broadband connections used by businesses. penetration rate, equating to 141.9% of households after climbing steeply by 4.3 percentage points. • This contrasts with mobile data subscriptions, which increased slightly as in the previous quarter, gaining 0.2 percentage points to finally account for 54.2% of households. RTR Internet Monitor 2018 Annual Report 9 Section 1 Broadband in Austria Fixed and mobile data volume – retail market Consistently higher volumes of fixed and mobile data used Mobile broadband data volume Fixed broadband data volume (from Q4 2017) Upload/download data volume in terabytes 1,000,000 800,000 600,000 400,000 200,000 109,876 124,488 142,937 194,174 223,084 235,177 266,823 310,423 713,868 346,185 788,382 344,283 738,608 369,727 788,471 433,550 855,575 0 Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 2016 2016 2016 2016 2017 2017 2017 2017 2018 2018 2018 2018 • Both among mobile and fixed network users, data usage increased The chart above shows the data volume in in Q4 2018. Compared year-on-year with the fourth quarter of 2017, terabytes that was uploaded and downloaded mobile traffic increased by 39.7% and fixed volumes by 19.9%. in the retail fixed and mobile markets (1 terabyte = 1,024 gigabytes = 1,048,576 • A total of 433,550 terabytes were consumed via mobile networks megabytes). The data volume for retail fixed in Q4 2018, which is a substantial 17.3% rise from the previous networks is only available from Q4 2017 quarter. onwards. • The data volume used via fixed networks amounted to 855,575 terabytes in the reference quarter, 8.5% more than in the preceding quarter. • The ratio of fixed to mobile data volumes continued to be roughly 2:1. 10 RTR Internet Monitor 2018 Annual Report Section 1 Broadband in Austria Fixed and mobile data volume per connection Unbroken strong growth in volume used under data subscriptions with set monthly rate Q4 2017 Q1 2018 Q2 2018 Q3 2018 Q4 2018 Data volume in GB per connection an month 120 100 80 60 40 20 97.0 107.1 99.9 107.1 115.8 47.1 53.2 51.0 53.7 65.2 4.1 4.6 5.1 5.6 5.9 0 Fixed data volume per Mobile data volume per active mobile Mobile data volume per other mobile fixed broadband line data subscription with set monthly rate subscription (smartphone subscriptions and tariff plans without a set monthly rate) • Based on the same quarter in the previous year, the strongest The chart shows the volume of data uploaded data usage growth rate in Q4 2018 was recorded for smartphone and downloaded in the fixed network and subscriptions and tariff plans without a set monthly rate (43.3%), mobile retail markets in gigabytes per with the rate for mobile data subscriptions including a set monthly connection and month.