The Red Sea is a global hot spot at the moment due to repeated attacks by Yemeni Houthi rebels against commercial shipping vessels.
While this inlet is a strategic location for global shipping, it also plays a vital role in global communications networks.
Another lap around the sun, a new TeleGeography State of the Network Report—a tradition we’ve kept since 2017.
No seven-year itch for us, though; we’re just getting started. As the world of telecommunications continues to turn, each edition brings even more to report on than the last.
Note: Our January promotion has ended, but you can still win a free map!
Click here to answer this month’s trivia question.
Many retail service providers, such as mobile operators, MVNOs, and cable broadband providers, rely heavily on wholesale carriers to transport and terminate their customers’ international calls.
Wholesale carriers terminated approximately 257 billion minutes of traffic in 2022, down 5% from 2021. Wholesale traffic declined at an average rate of 1% per year over the past ten years, compared to a -2% CAGR for overall traffic. Wholesale carriers terminated nearly three-fourths (72%) of international traffic in 2022, up from 70% the year before.
Traffic to mobile phones in emerging markets has spurred expansion in wholesalers' share of the overall market. In 2022, wholesale carriers terminated over 87% of traffic to Sub-Saharan Africa and South America. In contrast, wholesale carriers terminated only 56% of traffic to Western Europe.
Wholesale revenues have changed only marginally from ten years ago. But let’s take a moment to look under the hood.
By any measure, the global bandwidth market is thriving. International bandwidth demand has nearly doubled from 2020 to 2022, and has now reached 3.8 Pbps.
Meanwhile, the lit capacity on major submarine cable routes continues to soar, keeping pace with demand.
How? Is the network getting faster?
Not quite. Think bigger highway, not faster cars.
The year 2014 represents the peak for international voice traffic. International call minutes declined the following year, for the first time since the Great Depression—and it's been downhill ever since.
We're kicking off 2024 with a free webinar, and it's all about submarine cable security.
Join TeleGeography’s Greg Bryan and Ciena's Brian Lavallée on Wednesday, January 17 at 11:00 a.m. ET right from your desk, or couch, or favorite café.
If you caught Research Director Alan Mauldin’s Submarine Networks World presentation this year, then you know how well-versed he is in submarine cable geopolitics (and in cable knowledge in general).
So you shouldn’t be surprised to see Alan sharing his expertise throughout ABC News’ exciting new submarine cable documentary, The Cloud Under the Sea.
This hour-long program “uncovers the shadowy world of telecommunication sea cables.” Watch it below.
French telco group Iliad has submitted a proposal to UK-based Vodafone Group regarding the potential merger of their respective operations in Italy.
If successful, the merger will have a big impact on the Italian mobile market, reducing it from five players to four, while also combining the fixed broadband operations of the two companies.
The deal is by no means guaranteed to go through, however. Even if Vodafone’s response is positive, regulatory authorities must then study its effects on competition.
As another eventful year draws to a close, we’re looking back at the telecom stories that captured our readers’ attention throughout 2023.
With 5G rollouts, satellite broadband, SIM card registration and mega-mergers all on the agenda, the CommsUpdate team left no stone unturned in their quest to bring you the biggest daily news stories from around the world.
Read on for our most popular stories of 2023.
