Traffic on fixed-line telephone market in 2012 decreased significantly

The fixed-line telephone market in 2012, as the previous years, saw a significant decrease in the volume of traffic and the incomes coming from the provision of services for the population, despite an insignificant increase in the number of subscribers, Info-Prim Neo reports. According to the statistics of the national ICT regulator, the sales on the fixed-line telephone market fell by 114.94 million lei or 7.1% on 2011, to over 1.5 billion lei. The number of subscribers to the fixed-line telephone networks rose by 25,900 or 2.2%, to 1.2 million subscribers. The rise in the number of subscribers is due to the 26 alternative operators. They connected 29,900 new clients to their networks. The number of clients of SA Moldtelecom fell by 4,000. At the end of 2012, Moldtelecom had 1.1 million subscribers (93.2% of the total), while the alternative operators – 82,600 (6.8%). The traffic in the public fixed-line telephone networks fell by 8.8% on 2011, to over 3 billion minutes. A number of 27 operators worked on the fixed-line telephone market in 2012. SA Moldtelecom had a market share of 97.3%, while the 26 alternative operators, including Arax-Impex, Starnet, and Sun Communications, had together a market share of about 2.7%.