Romania’s telecoms market continues to evolve under the dynamics of competition and technological change. Alternative operators have launched competing services in the fixed-line voice market, with the provision of bundled services being a key driver.
The acquisition of Liberty Global’s local unit UPC Romania by Vodafone Group in July 2019 has allowed Vodafone Romania to compete more effectively with the service offerings from Orange Romania and Telekom Romania. To become more competitive in the market, Orange Romania in late 2020 signed an agreement in principle to acquire Telekom Romania from Deutsche Telekom, though Telekom Romania’s mobile assets could be sold separately in a bid to avoid scrutiny from competition authorities.
The mobile market is served by four network operators, three of which are the local subsidiaries of the major regional players Vodafone Group, Orange Group and Deutsche Telekom. Mobile broadband growth has been strong following network investments which have extended the reach of LTE services and led to the launch of services based on 5G. However, 5G services are not optimum since the MNOs have yet to secure sufficient spectrum following several auction delays.
Romania’s broadband market benefits from effective infrastructure-based competition. The country’s fibre sector has become one of the strongest in Europe in recent years, with a rapidly growing share of the fixed-line broadband market by subscriber lines. As a result, the country has one of the highest FttP penetration rates in the region, with 72.4% of connections offering data above 100Mb/s by early 2020. Operators including Orange Romania have built their own fibre infrastructure to gain independence from Telekom Romania’s wholesale access service.
This report provides an overview of Romania’s fast-developing telecommunications market, covering regulatory developments, major players and fixed-line infrastructure, and offering a variety of operational and financial statistics as well as a range of subscriber forecasts. The report also covers the mobile voice and data markets, including profiles of the major operators, updates on spectrum auctions and regulatory developments. In addition, the report provides insights into the growing broadband market, covering technologies, the major players and market developments.
Key developments:
- Multi-spectrum auction delayed to early 2021;Orange Romania begins building its own fibre network;
- Orange Romania covers all of Bucharest with 5G, providing data at up to 1.2Gb/s;
- Regulator reduces fixed termination rates 30%, effective from November 2020;
- Orange Romania and Vodafone Romania extend 2.3GHz licenses to end-2031;
- Regulator fines the MNOs for failing to provide sufficient mobile voice coverage as per their licence obligations;
- Cost of 5G licences reduced;
- Government scraps SIM card registration scheme over privacy concerns;
- Vodafone Romania trials NB-IoT;
- UPC Romania is rebranded under the Vodafone banner;
- About three-quarters of fixed broadband connections accessing 100Mb/s or above;
- Deutsche Telekom secures approval for sale of stake in Telekom Romania;
- Report update includes the regulator's market data to December 2019, State Statistics data for 2019, telcos' operating and financial data to Q3 2020, Telecom Maturity Index charts and analyses, recent market developments.
Get a Full Copy of this Report
Developing Telecoms market report summaries are produced in partnership with BuddeCom, the world’s largest continually updated online telecommunications research service.
The above article is a summary of the following BuddeCom report:
Report title: Romania - Telecoms, Mobile and Broadband - Statistics and Analyses
Edition: November 2020
Analyst: Henry Lancaster
Number of pages: 193
Companies mentioned in this report: UPC Romania, RCS&RDS, Telekom Romania, Vodafone Romania, Orange Romania, Digi Mobil
Single User PDF Licence Price: US$1150
For more information or to purchase a copy of the full report please use the following link: https://www.budde.com.au/Research/Romania-Telecoms-Mobile-and-Broadband-Statistics-and-Analyses/?r=83
