HSPA accounts for 17% of European broadband

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HSPA accounts for 17% of European broadband

By 2015, mobile broadband connections to PCs will reach 81m, says Berg

By CAROLINE GABRIEL

Published: 5 July, 2010

READ MORE: Metrics | Europe | Broadband | Dongle/Datacard | HSDPA

European carriers have led the way in promoting 3G connections as their customers' primary broadband connections. Mobile-only operators like O2 aim to increase their ARPU and customer loyalty by becoming the key broadband supplier, while many providers hope to use wireless to meet rural coverage targets. These strategies are starting to bear fruit, according to new research from Berg Insight, which says HSPA accounted for 17.3% of total broadband connections in Europe at the end of 2009.

The number of HSPA subscribers using wireless to connect their PCs grew by 71% during 2009 to reach 25m at the end of the year, and is forecast to continue to increase a CAGR of 21.6% until 2015, when these PC connections will reach 81m.

The north American market has evolved at a slower pace in this respect, says Berg, with mobile broadband accounting for just 7.1% of the total. Between 2009 and 2015, this region is expected to grow at a CAGR of 34.8% to reach 42m subscribers.

The levels of adoption of HSPA as a PC broadband technology vary significantly across Europe. "Austria is the most advanced market with a penetration rate of over 15%, corresponding to 40% of all broadband connections in the country. Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Ireland and Portugal have also penetration rates above 10%," says report author Marcus Persson. "Belgium, Netherlands and Greece have, on the other hand, penetration rates of less than 3%."

He believes the trend will accelerate as 3G, and later LTE, becomes a standard, embedded feature of laptops and netbooks. "The attach rate of embedded mobile broadband in notebooks was less than 5% in both Europe and north America last year. This will change as prices for the embedded modules decrease and an attach rate of almost 45% is expected in five years," said Persson.

The biggest supplier of mobile broadband embedded modules and dongles is Huawei, with 53% global share and a particularly strong position in Europe - though it is likely to face anti-dumping investigations by the European Union, following a complaint against Chinese dongle makers by Belgian player Option. Fellow Chinese vendor ZTE is in second place with 30% share. Berg estimates the global number of external mobile broadband devices shipped in 2009 was 66m, with Europe and north America accounting for 24.3m units and 5.6m units respectively.