New report by Africa Analysis has found that South Africa's fiber-to-the-business (FTTB) market is growing rapidly, with growth accelerating even more recently.
The ICT research firm said in its 'SA FTTB Market Update' report for Q3 2023, part of its Fiber Optic Access Market Tracking Programme, that there has been a marked increase in business interest in fiber optic connectivity.
“This can be interpreted as a sign of a positive recovery in the business market after the COVID-19 period,” Africa Analysis said in a statement on Wednesday.
The company said the report's key findings include:
- Market growth: By the end of September 2023, the FTTB market had over 243,000 active endpoints, registering a year-on-year growth rate of 6.4%. Approximately two-thirds of these links consisted of best-effort (contention) connections, and the remainder were dedicated (quality of service) connections.
- Increased best-effort connections: Competing best-effort connectivity products continued to show much stronger growth than dedicated links. This is primarily driven by the increased adoption of fiber connectivity by small and medium-sized businesses, as well as the increased adoption of cloud services and SD-WAN, where best effort (broadband-type connections) are sufficient for most sites in an organization.
- Market revenue: The FTTB retail market achieved annual revenue of R10.1 billion (September 2022 to September 2023), highlighting the economic importance of the sector in the changing telecommunications environment.
- Decrease in ARPL: Declining retail prices for many low-end fiber optic products are contributing to market growth, but are also having a dilutive effect on average revenue per line. It has steadily decreased compared to the previous year and is expected to continue decreasing in the future.
Africa Analysis states that the FTTB market is expected to continue its growth trajectory and exceed 300,000 connections by the end of 2027. In particular, the best-effort connectivity segment of the market will show much stronger growth than more expensive dedicated connectivity. – © 2024 News Central Media
