Agcom: Italy reduces the gap in the digital, mobile market still concentrated

Agcom Italy reduces the gap in the digital mobile market

(Finance) – The easing of the pandemic and the consequent economic acceleration have not stopped the “progressive erosion” of the resources of the electronic communications sectorwhich in 2021 register a down by 2.8% to 27.84 billioneven if the decline is less than the -4.8% recorded in 2020. Also the investments of € 7.55 billion (-0.7%).

THE traditional media (television, radio, newspapers and periodicals), after the strongly negative results that characterized 2020, highlights some signs of recoverywith a increase in revenues of 2.5% to a value of 11.4 billion euros, although there is still a reduction of 800 million compared to pre-pandemic levels (2019).

This is what emerged from the report of the AgCom to Parliament presented by the President Giacomo The sisterwho underlines that “the competitive dynamism of the sector remains high, both as a result of the consolidation processes between medium-sized operators, and by virtue of the entry into the fixed network of new players of significant economic weight such as PostePay, Iliad and Sky.

Looking at the mobile sectorthe Communications Authority indicates that it is confirmed very concentrated from a competitive point of viewincluding three operators – TIM, Vodafone and WINDTRE – with almost similar shares of around 30%. However, it should be noted that in 2021, Vodafone and WINDTRE lost some points in favor of Iliad and so-called Mvno or virtual mobile operators, which recorded an overall increase in turnover of 8.3%. On the fixed line, on the other hand, the growth trend of data traffic is confirmed, recording + 15.9%.

Analyzing the spread of broadband servicesthe Communications Authority reports that the broadband and ultra-broadband access residential and business have achieved 18.7 million unitsequivalent to 31.7 lines per 100 inhabitants. In particular, the ratio is equal to 24.4 lines per 100 inhabitants for connections above 30 Mbit / s and 19.5 lines per 100 inhabitants for speeds above 100 Mbit / s. “As already highlighted in previous annual reports, significant territorial differences remain in the penetration of these services”, explains AgCom, pointing out above all the persistence of a gap between North and South-Islands in access to these services.

The President of AgCom then highlighted that the “data published yesterday by the European Commission referring toindex of digitization of the economy and society – the so-called DESI – in addition to showing a great acceleration of digitization in Italy, they do us jump to 7th place for connectivity between the countries of the Union. Last year we were in 23rd place. “A result achieved thanks to the use of the 5G DSS technology in which WINDTRE has particularly believed.

Looking at the global marketthere is a leap in e-Commerce and the amount revenues made on a global scale from the main platforms – AlphabetAmazon, AppleMeta and Microsoft – continues to grow and reaches i 1.100 billion euros (+ 24% compared to the previous year and more than double compared to 2017). The tendency persists to “implement strategies of horizontal differentiation and / or vertical integration, which result in the proposition, in aggregate form, of an increasingly vast offer of different services” – underlines the authority – and this can “generate a competitive advantage, in terms of quantity and variety of data acquired on the individuals who use the services, difficult to replicate by one’s competitors.

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