PRESS

SPAIN STAGNATES AS TELEFONICA PROFITS: BROADBAND STUDY SHOWS

Pro-competition body ECTA warns policy-makers against yielding to dominant telcos’ demands for special treatment of fibre networks. Growth and investment in high speed networks depends on competition

Brussels, 2 March 2009 – Broadband connections across the EU rose by 20% over the year, to a total of 110.5m connections, representing 22.5% of Europe’s population, according to ECTA’s latest twice-yearly EU Broadband Scorecard, published today.  But the pro-competition body warns that in countries such as Spain, where the incumbent operator, Telefonica, continues to increase its control of the market with more than 57% of all retail broadband connections, the market has stagnated with the result that Spain is languishing below the OECD and EU average with a broadband penetration rate of only 20% and low growth rates.

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