Broadband services poised for mass-market adoption in Southeast Asia
ConvergenceAsia Staff
21/06/2007

Global communications solutions provider, Alcatel-Lucent, has announced key findings from its Broadband for All End User Research, an annual global broadband services user survey on end user needs and expectations.

In its second year, the study has been expanded from the 2006 survey, which covered seven markets, Brazil, Russia, Egypt, Kenya, India, Malaysia and China, including 400 respondents from Malaysia. Three additional markets, Vietnam, Philippines and Indonesia were included this year to deliver greater insights for the Southeast Asia region.

"Southeast Asia is a one of the fastest growing markets for broadband services and offers a largely untapped user base for service providers to grow their networks, expand their broadband footprint, and transform their business," said Valérie Faudon, Alcatel-Lucent's Vice President of Marketing Programs.

This research can give service providers practical insights and findings to help shape and transform their broadband services to meet real-life user needs, she said.

In May 2007, phone interviews were carried out with respondents in the states of Malacca, Perak and Negri Sembilan of Malaysia; Surabaya and Bandung of Indonesia; Manila and Cebu in the Philippines; and Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam.

Alcatel-Lucent surveyed a total of 1,200 existing and new residential broadband subscribers, and "floating" users who access the web at Internet cafes and at work. This last group represents an untapped market of potential residential broadband subscribers which providers can reach out.

Alcatel-Lucent found that 60 per cent of users who access the Internet outside the home at public hotspots and at work also own a PC at home, and 80 per cent expressed interest in signing up for a personal broadband subscription. In addition, 60 per cent of new subscribers who have recently signed up for home broadband services said that they are "extremely satisfied" with their current broadband subscription.

Broadband is at the early adopter stage in Southeast Asia when compared to more developed markets like South Korea and Japan, with prices still higher than affordable for the mass market.

"The building blocks for broadband to transition to a mass-market service in Southeast Asia are all in place and need just one more push from local operators in the form of accessible entry-level broadband packages," said Pierre Alain Cadillon, Vice President of Alcatel-Lucent's Southeast Asia activities.

The recent survey findings indicate that these markets are reaching the critical user mass needed to achieve economies of scale and three key factors are needed for this to happen.

The first is accelerating PC usage and penetration within the population. The second is to create and offer new, affordable and innovative broadband services to stimulate broadband adoption. The third is to transform from a copper-based telecommunications infrastructure to next generation fibre- and IP-based wireless broadband networks to support evolving communications services.

"Once this happens, we will begin to achieve economic diversity through e-commerce and online trade, raise the general level of education, productivity and offer a stable platform for long-term economic and social progress for high growth markets in Southeast Asia," said Cadillon.

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