The number of active broadband wireline subscribers reach 597 million as of the end of 2011 and is projected to have passed the 600 million threshold this quarter, according to figures from Point Topic released by the Broadband Forum. While new installations have slowed in developed markets with high-penetration rates, developing markets, especially Brazil, Russia, India and China are seeing strong demand. Overall, broadband growth is estimated at 65,493,596 lines, bringing the global total to 597,322,636, a quarterly increase of 2.6% - and an annual growth rate of 12.3%.
DSL continues to hold the biggest share of the broadband market -- 60.8% of the overall market share, compared to 19.4% for cable modems. Hybrid fiber/DSL deployment is continues to grow as the preferred architecture for many carriers.
"This is an exciting return to higher growth figures and points to a strengthening in the broadband market," commented Robin Mersh, CEO of the Broadband Forum. "With a number of active new markets coming online and standards based deployments becoming common - we are seeing broadband move into the daily lives of more and more people the world over. A great example of this is the exceptional growth in some key Eastern European markets, such as Russia, Poland and the Ukraine."
The Broadband Forum noted that IPTV penetration continues to rise -- Q4 2011 was the best quarter yet with net additions of 3.68 million. This brings the IPTV installed base to 58.2 million subscribers worldwide. Though Europe still holds the top regional spot - China is the fastest growing country and now has over 12 million subscribers, outstripping France for the first time.
A number of activities are underway at the Broadband Forum, including:
- an expansion of the Broadband Forum Certification Program to include G-PON certification for ONUs, an interoperability test suite, as well as XG-PON test requirements
- MMBI certification option for Ethernet Service emulation over MPLS
- TR-069 CWMP Device Conformance Program
- End-to-End Multi-service Network Architecture work will progress
- Network interworking and convergence work in collaboration with 3GPP
- Work on MPLS in Carrier Ethernet Networks, as well as new MPLS in Mobile Backhaul Initiative (MMBI) developments, including energy efficient mobile backhaul
- DSL testing, including VDSL2, bonding, vectoring, G.fast requirements and DQM measures
- New access node management models and interface specifications
- New access work is beginning around business services; cloud, data center interconnection and machine-to-machine (M2M) requirements as well.
