(23 April 2007 3:00 pm)

MUMBAI: Global Insight, which provides economic and financial analysis and forecasting has announced the findings of its inaugural report produced by Global Insight's new Telecoms Intermodal Forecasting Service.

The report concluded that China and India will remain the world's growth engine for wireless services, accounting for 60 per cent of the 1.2 billion predicted new mobile subscribers over the next five years.

The report compares the world's 20 leading developed and emerging markets between 2006 and 2011, and predicts that over the next five years, market penetration of wireless services will grow from 34.8 per cent to 69.1 per cent in China; and from 13.4 per cent to 31 per cent in India.

According to the report, China will also outpace the other 19 markets in terms of broadband growth, accounting for more than one-third of the 350 million-plus new broadband subscriptions anticipated over the next five years. By 2011, China, with broadband revenues of more than $19 billion and four times the subscribers, will surpass Japan as the world's second-largest broadband market.

However, the US will continue to maintain its position as the world's largest mobile and broadband market by revenues over the forecast period.

Global Insight Telecom Products director Julian Watson says, "The bulk of the revenues for the sector will still come from the developed markets. Another notable conclusion is that the so-called death of the landline has been overstated, even if traditional landline revenues will take a massive hit. "

More than $50 billion in revenues will be lost world-wide over the forecast period due to fixed-line subscriber declines and the migration of voice traffic to mobile and VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) networks. A 4.5 per cent decline is predicted in traditional fixed-line accesses as the growth in the China and India markets fail to offset the erosion of traditional accesses in markets like Japan, South Korea, and Europe; the latter of which has already seen extensive migration of accesses from fixed lines to mobile.

"Primarily as a result of substitution, the next five years will see a fundamental shift in the revenue make-up of the global telecoms industry. In these 20 markets, fixed-line's share of total telecoms revenues will collectively fall from 39 per cent in 2006 to 21 per cent in 2011; while by the end of 2011, mobile will account for over two-thirds of total telecoms revenues in those markets.

"But as our research shows, disparate local regulatory, competitive, and economic conditions will mean that the pace of substitution will vary greatly across the 20 markets. Traditional telcom firms are seeking to offset or reduce substitution effects by moving into multimedia and convergent markets such as IPTV (Internet Protocol Television) and Fixed-to-Mobile Convergence (FMC), but this will not always be sufficient to protect and enhance their revenues," he concluded.