ANRTI forecasts a significant growth of the market of IP telephone services

The specialists of the National Agency for Telecommunications and Information Regulation (ANRTI) consider that, in 2006, the market of IP telephony services will continue to grow in the same tempos registered in 2005. They made the forecast on the basis of annual statistic reports presented by authorised companies to supply IP telephony services and evolution of this level of market. According to ANRTI data, in 2003-2005 the growth tempo of the international voice traffic on the base of IP- telephony got over those of the traditional international call traffic. If in 2005, the volume of this traffic increased, compared to 2004, with 12%, than the international voice traffic through IP- telephony technology increased with 29.2%. The total volume of international voice traffic registered in 2005, by the national telephony operator Moldtelecom and those 17 alternative operators of IP telephony increased, compared to 2004, with 14%, over 111 million minutes. The quota on the market of those 17 operators, calculated according to number of registered minutes, was 47.57%, and that of the national operator – 52.43%. And from point of view of the structure of the international voice traffic there is a stable trend of increase of the traffic volume on the base of IP telephony. If in 2003 the quota of this traffic was 6.6% of the whole volume of international calls, in 2004 – 14.1 %, than in 2005 it grew to 17.08%. The specialists of the agency explain the fast growth of the international voice traffic on IP telephony by promoting by the operators of certain more attractive and accessible services, from point of view of the price, for final users. The tariffs for these services, depending on the destination country and the type of network of the phone call, are, in average, for mobile networks, with 30%, and for fix networks – twice lower than the tariffs existent at the traditional international telephony. For example, a minute made via IP – telephony in fix networks of Italy or Germany costs 0.17 – 0.19 dollars, and - via traditional telephony – 0.46 dolars. IP telephony (providing telephony services according to Internet protocol) is a modern technology ensuring transmission of the voice via transport networks and fixed ones or mobile, technology that is implemented in Moldova for 6 years. Operators of IP telephony of the country provide usually international telephony services. Of those 127 licence owners for providing IP telephony services, 17 provided in 2005 international telephony services on the basis of this technology.