DSL continues to outgrow other broadband access technologies
That growth of 45% – over 100,000 every day – means that more than 125 million homes and businesses now enjoy the benefits of broadband DSL.
By the end of 2005, global DSL subscribers will approach 140 million, extending its share of the total broadband access market.
European Union countries accounted for close to 40% of the total growth in new broadband DSL subscribers in the period, confirming the EU’s position as the number one most active DSL region worldwide.
The UK and France led the way, each adding more than three million subscribers.
The Middle East and Africa region was the fastest growing, with a 140% increase in DSL subscribers – led by Turkey, which added more than 850,000, becoming the first country in the region to pass the one million mark.
In South Africa the ADSL subscriber base more than doubled in 2005. Currently there are just over 110 000 DSL subscribers in South Africa.
Latin America has established a DSL subscriber base of more than five million.
Brazil added 1.1 million in the year and Mexico saw 98% growth in its subscribers to DSL.
A total of 19 countries achieved more than one million subscribers by the third quarter of 2005, with Australia, Belgium, Turkey, Poland, Sweden and Switzerland breaking through the barrier in the past year.
China alone added almost 10 million DSL subscribers and is rapidly approaching 25 million in total.
The USA extended its lead over Japan as the second largest DSL population in the world, and nine countries increased their DSL population by more than one million new subscribers.
Of the established nations, the fastest growth rates were in Australia, at 97%, and the UK, at 91%.
Seven countries have over 20% of phone lines delivering broadband services using DSL.
The figure of 20% ADSL line penetration was also mentioned by Papi Molotsane, CEO of Telkom, as a target for the end of 2008.
“As broadband DSL reaches mass market levels, supporting multiple services and delivering voice, data and video take on greater importance”, says Michael Brusca, chairman of the DSL Forum.
“In Belgium and France, for example, IPTV (internet protocol television) is an increasingly mainstream market driver.
"IPTV is a relatively new service offering but had already won almost 1.5 million subscribers around the world in the first half of 2005, 30% of them in Hong Kong alone and a further 18% in France", said Tim Johnson of Point Topic.
"All major telcos are now committed to providing IPTV services and while it is not yet a "killer application", take up is accelerating.
Millions more people are accessing free video and television resources available over the internet – there are more than 1.3 million in the UK alone, spending an average of five hours each week using them.
IPTV has the potential to develop into an entirely new medium because of its ability to integrate many different media and provide user-friendly interactivity."
“As IPTV is gaining as a global broadband market driver, the DSL Forum continues to keep up their pace by addressing technical capabilities and interoperability of the network to support video as well as Voice over IP and enhanced data services by building on our specified end to end architecture, remote management and automation of service selection and delivery,” added Michael Brusca.
South Africa’s Telkom is trialing IPTV, but no proposed launch date or other details about this service is available.
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