The combined revenues of the Colombian telecoms industry, including broadcasting services, amounted to 24.3tn pesos (US$5.54bn) in 2021, up 10.5 per cent compared with 2020, according to an annual sector report from sector regulator CRC.
Looking specifically at telecoms (fixed and mobile telephony, fixed and mobile internet, and pay-TV), growth was driven by fixed broadband, where revenues rose 18.9 per cent in real terms to 6.17tn pesos.
Mobile internet, for which sales grew 10.4 per cent last year, continues to generate the largest slice of telecoms revenues, contributing 7.96tn pesos in 2021.
“58 per cent of revenues in 2021 were from fixed and mobile internet services, which grew at real rates of 18.9 per cent and 10.4 per cent, respectively, reflecting the higher connectivity needs of households and businesses,” CRC stated in the report.
On the flip-side, legacy telecoms services, namely mobile voice/SMS and landlines, continue to lose ground to other means of access among Colombians, which has had a direct impact on service providers’ revenues.
Revenues from mobile and fixed telephony declined 6.8 per cent and 2.9 per cent last year, reaching 2.59tn pesos(US$592,333,000) and 1.88tn pesos, respectively.
Despite the uneven revenue performance across the various segments, all of them saw growth in the user base compared with 2020.
The main highlight in terms of subscriber growth was mobile internet (3G and 4G), with nearly 38mn accesses recorded by year-end, up 16.8 per cent, whereas mobile telephony (mostly 2G) saw a 10.9 per cent increase to 75mn accesses.
Next was fixed internet (7.7% growth, 8.43mn accesses), fixed telephony (+7.9%, to 7.55mn accesses), and pay TV (+1.7%, to 6.17mn accesses).
Notably, mobile internet traffic grew by 84.8 per cent to 1.89bn gigabytes of data, from the 1.03bn gigabytes in 2020.
In 2021, more Colombian households subscribed to fixed internet provided via fiber and copper lines. Some 530,000 fiber accesses were added in the period, ending the year at nearly 1.8mn (22.1% of the total), whereas cable internet gained 290,000 to 5.1mn (60.4% of total) at year-end.
As a result, fixed internet download speeds doubled in 2021, according to CRC, reaching an average of 76.2Mbps as of December.
In fixed telephony, of the 7.55mn accesses (+6%) recorded at year-end, 86.5 per cent were in households. As an ongoing effect of the pandemic, corporate landlines declined 4.1 per cent.
Finally, pay-TV continues to under-perform other services amid the cord-cutting trend in the region and the advance of streaming services, although in the case of Colombia, the segment remains in expansion.
As of the end of 2021, 6.17mn Colombians were subscribed to a pay-TV plan, 1.7 per cent more than in 2020. Around 65 per cent of pay-TV accesses were via digital hybrid fiber coaxial (HFC) technology, 20.4 per cent via satellite and 10.7 per cent via IPTV (fiber).
The remainder were provided via what CRC describes as analog HFC.
