While the local mobile phone service industry is bracing for robust growth, the radio paging service sector has shown signs of slack, according to a government report.
The Ministry of Transportation and Communications (MOTC) yesterday released its market analysis of local mobile phone and radio paging services. The report covers the first half of the year and indicates the mobile phone service industry's prospects are promising because of its rapid market penetration.
As of June, there were 7.48 million mobile phone users islandwide, up 4.93 million since March 1998, when the private mobile phone services hit the market to compete against state-run Chunghwa Telecom (中華電信). Every month, there was an average of 330,000 additional new subscribers.
The report showed private service providers have outperformed its major state-run rival in terms of user numbers and traffic volumes.
As of June, the number of mobile phone subscribers using private services reached 4.75 million, 1.7 times more than the number using Chunghwa Telecom. Meanwhile, the average private subscriber spoke for 111.8 minutes, 20.7 minutes longer than Chunghwa Telecom's users.
Having 2.72 million users, Chunghwa Telecom still held the biggest market share (36.4 percent), but the figure declined sharply from its 71.2 percent share recorded in March 1998. Every month, it signed up 61,000 new subscribers of the average 330,000 new users overall.
Meanwhile, seven private mobile phone service providers signed up 4.75 million users in the first half of the year, accounting for an aggregate market share of 63.6 percent, up from 28.8 percent in March 1998.
On average, there were 268,000 new users of these private service providers monthly.
As for the industry's market penetration rate, as of June, 34 percent of Taiwan's population used mobile phone services, up from 11.7 percent in March 1998.
The sharp growth indicated there was rapid adoption of mobile phone technology, the MOTC said.
Over the first half, mobile phone users chattered for a total of 3.91 billion minutes, up 72.6 percent from the second half of 1998. Each user spoke for an average 103.7 minutes, up 11.3 percent from the second half of 1998.
Over the same period, the mobile phone service industry generated NT$46.80 billion in revenue, up 22 percent from the second half of last year.
Revenues realized by Chunghwa Telecom accounted for 37 percent of the total, down 9 percent from the second half of 1998, while the private sector accounted for the remaining 63 percent.
The revenue increase was attributed in large part to rapid market penetration between December and June. Fueling the rapid adoption were drops in mobile phone set costs, monthly fees and airtime fees, which made service more affordable.
Unlike mobile phone services, the use of radio paging service has shown signs of a slowdown. As of June, there were 4.26 million radio paging subscribers, up 1.16 million since March 1998, but down slightly since the end of last year.
The report concluded that the penetration of radio paging in the local market has been slowing since February. In addition, there has been a decline in the number of paging calls.
For example, the monthly average number of paging calls declined by 17.9 percent to 51.9 calls since the latter half of 1998.
Having 1.87 million subscribers, Chunghwa Telecom continued to hold the biggest market share (43.9 percent). However, that share shrank from 85.2 percent in March 1998.
The decrease was attributed to a number of promotion campaigns launched by mobile phone service providers, who encouraged many paging service users to switch from paging to mobile phones.
Over the first half, radio paging service generated NT$5.06 billion in revenue, down 15.8 percent from NT$6.01 billion during the second half of last year.
Of the amount, Chunghwa Telecom took in NT$2.48 billion, while the private providers accounted for the remaining NT$1.58 billion.
The report also showed that Chunghwa Telecom paging service is more expensive, as the cost of its service was NT$5.13 per call. Private services charged on average just NT$2.12 per call.
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