The demand for data-based services in the Pacific region is growing, aligning with similar trends around the world. In particular, the demand for mobile broadband is increasing due to mobile services being the primary and most wide-spread source for internet access across the region.

India's rural teledensity jumps from 44% in March 2014 to 59% in September 2021, said a statement from the Ministry of Communications.

Slovak operators Swan and Swan Mobile (4ka) merged to create a full-fledged telecommunications operator with an offer of convergent, fixed, and mobile services.

Croatian telecommunications company Hrvatski Telekom (HT) has implemented free WiFi internet in the Town of Obrovac and the municipalities of Konavle and Perusic, which provides access to the internet in public locations for citizens and visitors.

Argentina’s ongoing problem with hyperinflation continues to distort the telecom market’s performance, which shows strong growth in revenue but only modest gains in subscriber numbers each year.

Although El Salvador is the smallest country in central America geographically, it has the fourth largest economy in the region. Economic potential is limited by the relatively small population, while the country’s telecom sector has been restricted by poor infrastructure and unequal income distribution.

India has constituted a Technology Innovation Group (TIG) to prepare a manufacturing and services ecosystem to capitalise on Sixth Generation or 6G opportunity in the telecom sector.

Mobile number portability (MNP) is expected to start in Uruguay 12 January 2022, the national regulator Unidad Reguladora de Servicios de Comunicaciones (URSEC) said in a press note.

Sri Lanka’s fixed-line telephony market was one of the very few in the world to experience a significant upsurge in subscriptions in 2020. While the country suffers from a relatively poor fixed-line infrastructure and a correspondingly strong mobile sector, demand for traditional phone services increased 14% in 2020.

Tanzania’s telecom sector enjoys effective competition, particularly in the mobile segment. There remains considerable movement within it, with Smart having stopped services in late 2019 and Tigo Tanzania having completed its merger with Zantel. Tigo Tanzania in April 2021 was sold by its parent company MIC as it sought to focus on its operations in Latin America.

Following elections held in August 2021, Zambia's new government immediately established a Ministry of Technology and Science to promote the use of ICT in developing economic growth and social inclusion. This focus on ICT, and on telecoms in particular, has been central to government strategies for some years.

Until late 2020, Lesotho’s telecom regulator maintained a market duopoly between the privatised national operator, Econet Telecom Lesotho (ETL), which is focussed on fixed-line services, and Vodacom Lesotho, which dominates the mobile sector.

CMLink, China Mobile's subsidiary in Canada, will cease operation in Canada due to fears expressed by the federal government.

Angola’s telecom sector in recent years has benefited from political stability, which has encouraged foreign investment in the sector. The government and regulator have also set in train mechanisms to open up the telecom sector to new competitors, with Africell having secured a universal licence and in so doing becoming the country’s fourth MNO.

Ghana’s telecom market has undergone several changes in recent years, following the privatisation of the incumbent telco Ghana Telecom and its rebranding as Vodafone Ghana. Two of the key players merged to form AirtelTigo in 2017, though in mid-2020 the parent companies of the operator decided to exit the market. The sale and transfer of AirtelTigo to the state was completed in November 2021.

Indian telecom equipment manufacturer HFCL (formerly Himachal Futuristic Communications Limited) has been recognised as the ‘Trusted Source’ by the National Security Council Secretariat (Trusted Telecom Cell), a part of the National Security Council, who advises the Prime Minister’s Office on matters of national security and strategic interest.

Eritrea’s telecom sector operates under a state-owned monopoly for fixed and mobile services. Partly as a result of such restrictions on competition, the country has the least developed telecommunications market in Africa.

The slow process to open up Ethiopia’s telecom market was completed with the licensing of the Safaricom-led Global Partnership for Ethiopia consortium. The country had been one of the last in Africa to allow its national telco a monopoly on all telecom services including fixed, mobile, internet and data communications.

The combined telecommunications industrial revenue in China rose 8.1 percent year on year to over 1.35 trillion yuan (about 212 billion U.S. dollars) in the January-November period, registering robust growth.

China Telecom’s US unit China Telecom Americas (CTA)announced that it plans to continue providing some services in the US in 2022 after a regulator revoked its authorisation to operate telecommunications in the country, citing espionage concerns.

During the last few years Libya has struggled to rebuild its economy and infrastructure following disruption caused by the civil war and the subsequent political unrest. Much of the telecom infrastructure was destroyed or stolen following the 2011 disturbances, including about a quarter of the country’s mobile tower sites.

For many years Oman’s mobile market was a duopoly between the incumbent telco Omantel and its challenger Ooredoo Oman. In February 2021, Vodafone Group and Oman Future Telecommunications consortium secured a license to operate the Sultanate’s third network, with services being under the Vodafone Oman brand. The new operator has been able to extend its reach based on a tower leasing arrangement signed in 2020 with Oman Tower Company.

Kuwaiti mobile telecommunications company Zain Kuwait said its 5G traffic accounts for more than 40 percent of its total wireless traffic.

Fixed-line teledensity in Papua New Guinea has seen little change over the past two decades.

Fiji has a relatively sophisticated communications infrastructure with the highest mobile and internet penetration in the Pacific Islands. It is the leading market to watch in terms of both LTE and 5G development in this region.

For many years, GSM was the primary mobile technology for Vanuatu’s 300,000 people. Recent infrastructure projects have improved access technologies, with a transition to 3G and, to a limited degree, to LTE.

Samoa was one of the first Pacific Island countries to establish a regulatory infrastructure and to liberalise its telecom market. In 2006, it became the first in the region to see the market entrance of Digicel, which has since launched services in other Pacific nations.

Bharat FIH, formerly Rising Stars Mobile India, a subsidiary of FIH Mobiles, a Foxconn Technology Group Company, has filed for an initial public offering of up to INR 50.04 billion ($662.97 million).

Indian operators and network technology providers apparently want an extension of the deadline for responses to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India's (TRAI) consultation paper on the sale of 5G spectrum.

Argentina's Camara de Cooperativas de Telecomunicaciones (Chamber of Telecommunications Cooperatives, or Catel) has announced that Imowi, its MVNO service, will launch on 20 January 2022.

China Mobile, the world's largest mobile network operator, aims to raise as much as 56 billion yuan (GBP6.7bn, USD $8.8 billion) when it lists its shares in Shanghai following the country's biggest public offering in a decade.

Indosat Oordeoo, a telecommunications provider in Indonesia, prepares a network capacity of 44 PB per day to meet the needs of the community’s digital activity which is predicted to increase during Christmas and New Year (Nataru) holidays.

Dito Telecommunity Corporation, a telecommunications company in the Philippines, said that it hit its target of five million subscriptions before the end of 2021, and reported revenues of PHP2 billion (USD40.1 million) in the nine months since its commercial launch back in March.