tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 1
Industry analysis #1 2020
Mobile data – full year 2019
The gig economy: 58% more gigabytes
generated 0.4% more revenue
5G monetisation lessons from China and Korea
Tefficient’s 26th public
analysis on the
development and drivers
of mobile data ranks 105
operators based on
average data usage per
SIM, total data traffic and
revenue per gigabyte in
2019.
The data usage per SIM
grew for each and every
operator. 44% could turn
that data usage growth
into ARPU growth.
Identify the skilled
minority that delivered on
“more for more”.
In this analysis, we take
5G monetisation lessons
from China and Korea.
Surely 5G could increase
data usage – but what
happens to ARPU?
T-Mobile, CZ +304%
Zain, KW
DNA, FI3, AT
Zain, BH +1%
Jio, IN +8%
Plus Cyfrowy Polsat, PL +7%3, ID +117%
Indosat, ID +146%
Kyivstar, UA +120%
Beeline, UZ +123%VEON, PK +103%
0
5
10
15
20
25
FY 2018 FY 2019
GB
pe
r S
IM p
er
mo
nth
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 2
Eighteen operators above 10 GB per SIM per month in 2019
Figure 1 shows the average mobile data usage for 105 reporting or reported1 mobile operators globally with
values for the full year of 2019 or for the first half of 2019.
Figure 1. Average data usage per reported SIM per month – all operators
As it’s not easy to read Figure 1 we will break it down into three regions of the world, but let’s first identify
the global data usage podium – see Figure 2.
There is a change at the top: Zain Kuwait has overtaken DNA as the operator with the highest
mobile data consumption per SIM. With 27.7 GB of data per SIM per month in 2019, Zain
records the highest-ever average usage to date. Zain launched 5G in June 2019 and sells smartphone plans
with massive buckets – up to 1 TB per month with 4G and up to 2 TB per month with 5G. Zain is also
offering data-only plans with buckets up to 6 TB – and one premium truly unlimited data-only plan.
With 25.4 GB, the previous number one, DNA from Finland, gets the silver medal. Unlimited,
speed-tiered, plans – both for smartphones and data-only – form a key component of the Finnish
1 By regulators – if reported latest 7 April 2020
0 5 10 15 20 25 30
Zain, KW
DNA, FI
3, AT
Elisa, FI
FarEasTone, TW
Taiwan Mobile, TW
Zain, SA
Zain, BH
Chunghwa, TW
Nova, IS
*Telia, FI
Zain, JO
3, DK
**Digi, MY
**Maxis, MY
Jio, IN
Telia, DK
Celcom, MY
Telenor, SE
**LG Uplus, KR
3, SE
TDC, DK
Bite, LT
China Unicom, CN
3 Europe, Group
**dtac, TH
Tele2, SE
Plus Cyfrowy Polsat, PL
AIS, TH
**Free, FR
*3, UK
3, ID
Tele2, LT
Play, PL
Telia, LT
Telenor, DK
China Telecom, CN
Zain, Group
**Bouygues, FR
China Mobile, CN
***Wind 3, IT
Ice, NO
Vodafone, IT
Síminn, IS
Swisscom, CH
Airtel, IN
**Starhub, SG
Vodafone, TR
Orange, PL
XL, ID
**MegaFon, RU
**Turkcell, TR
Movistar, CL
Telia, NO
MTS, RU (smartphone)
Indosat, ID
Movistar, ES
**Singtel, SG
Vodafone, ES
Telia, SE
Movistar, PE
**Beeline, RU
Vodafone, IS
**Türk Telekom, TR (4G-only)
Vodafone, UK
Vodafone Idea, IN
Telkomsel, ID 1)
**MTN Irancell, IR
T-Mobile, CZ
**TIM, BR
Vodafone, PT
Vodafone, RO
Telenor, NO
O2, UK
**TIM, IT
Telenor, Group
Vodafone Ziggo, NL 1)
Vodafone, DE
**Kyivstar, UA
Vodafone, Group
Smart, PH
Vivo, BR
**Djezzy, DZ
**Proximus, BE
Movistar, AR
**Orange, BE
O2, DE
*Telekom, DE
Dialog, LK
Globe, PH
Movistar, MX
**Beeline, UZ
Vodafone, GR
**VEON, PK
Movistar, CO
Robi, BD
Vodafone, EG
**Grameenphone, BD
**Banglalink, BD
Zain, IQ
**MTN, ZA
Zain, SD
Vodacom, Group
**MTN, NG
Ncell, NP
Gbyte per reported SIM per month
FY 2019 1H 2019
*) Calculated as country total minus all other (reporting) operators**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage
***) Calculated as 3 Europe total minus all other 3 operations1) FY 2019 = Q1-Q3 2019
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 3
market logic. DNA doesn’t report2 how large share of its base that has unlimited plans, but for Finland as a
whole, that share was 74% of non-M2M SIMs in December 2019. The Finnish operators all launched 5G in
2019, but DNA was the last to do so in December and then only as a solution for fixed wireless. (DNA has in
2020 expanded that offering into general mobile as well). DNA did nevertheless have the fastest growth in
mobile data usage among the three Finnish operators in 2019, but the 22% growth rate was slower than
previous years.
Figure 2. Average data usage per reported SIM per month – top 16 operators
Drei (3) Austria defends its bronze position from our previous report. The company carried 44% of
Austria’s total mobile data traffic in 2019. The Austrian home internet plans were pretty much
invented by Drei and come with unlimited, speed-tiered, data. Hybrid routers are now offered
by all operators (A1, Magenta and Drei) to speed up the slow fixed internet that is characteristic for Austria.
Unlimited smartphone plans are though a relatively new thing in Austria – Magenta and A1 (and finally also
Drei) introduced these in 2019.
Below the podium we find Elisa from Finland (20.7 GB per SIM per month in 2019). In spite of launching 5G
months before its two competitors Telia and DNA (well before there were any 5G terminals to deliver), there
wasn’t any 5G effect on Elisa’s overall mobile data usage: It grew 20% in 2019, a tad slower than for DNA.
2 Telenor Group acquired DNA in 2019 and reporting standard might change
27,7
25,4
24,8
20,7
20,6
20,1
19,4
16,5
15,5
13,9
13,8
12,0
11,7
11,4
23,7
22,6
19,2
18,4
18,3
14,1
15,4
13,9
12,0
8,6
10,7
11,2
Zain, KW
DNA, FI
3, AT
Elisa, FI
FarEasTone, TW
Taiwan Mobile, TW
Zain, SA
Zain, BH
Chunghwa, TW
Nova, IS
*Telia, FI
Zain, JO
3, DK
**Digi, MY
**Maxis, MY
Jio, IN
Gbyte per reported SIM per month
FY 2019 1H 2019
*) Calculated as country total minus all other (reporting) operators**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage
1
2
3
https://tefficient.com/mobile-data-operators-1h-2019/
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 4
Elisa is chased by the two Taiwanese operators FarEasTone (20.6 GB) and Taiwan Mobile (20.1 GB).
Zain’s operations in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain follow as #7 and #8. In position 9 we find Taiwan’s
Chunghwa that has significantly lower usage (15.5 GB) compared to FarEasTone and Taiwan Mobile but
the fastest growth – 36% in 2019.
The fastest growth in Figure 2 is though with Digi from Malaysia. In 2019, its average usage grew 83%
and Digi thereby surpassed its local competitor Maxis (+47%) in average data usage.
Zain Bahrain had the slowest growth – just 1%. It is not just slowest among the operators in Figure 2, but
the slowest of all our studied operators globally. We have compiled many reports like this over the years, but
we have not yet spotted an operator without growth in the overall mobile data usage.
Also Jio from India (#16) features slow growth – 8% in 2019.
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 5
Europe: Nordic operators and ‘3’ dominate the top
Now to the first of three breakdowns: Europe. The number 2 and 3 of the world, DNA Finland and Drei (3)
Austria, tops this chart with Elisa as third.
Figure 3. Average data usage per reported SIM per month – European operators
Nova from Iceland is ranked as number 4 based on the latest available 1H 2019 data. Telia from Finland
follows. Since Telia doesn’t report its mobile data traffic, we have assigned the country residual to Telia
(after having deducted Elisa’s and DNA’s reported traffic). A bunch of Danish and Swedish operators follow
based on latest available 1H 2019 data.
The bottom seven operators are from the low usage markets3 of Greece (Vodafone), Germany (Telekom,
O2, Vodafone), Belgium (Orange, Proximus) and the Netherlands (Vodafone Ziggo).
Who is then having the fastest usage growth in Europe? It’s T-Mobile Czech Republic with a
whopping 304% – from just 0.7 GB per month in 2018 to 3.0 GB per month in 2019. After years of
3 See our latest country data usage report: https://tefficient.com/usage-up-but-monetisation-falters/
25,424,8
20,7
13,9
8,4
7,77,5
7,36,96,96,7
6,35,8
5,8
5,75,1
4,44,1
3,33,03,03,0
2,82,62,5
2,31,91,81,81,8
1,3
15,4
12,010,7
9,59,2
8,6
7,7
6,6
5,8
5,7
4,8
4,13,6
2,9
0 5 10 15 20 25 30
DNA, FI
3, AT
Elisa, FI
Nova, IS
*Telia, FI
3, DK
Telia, DK
Telenor, SE
3, SE
TDC, DK
Bite, LT
Tele2, SE
Plus Cyfrowy Polsat, PL
**Free, FR
*3, UK
Tele2, LT
Play, PL
Telia, LT
Telenor, DK
**Bouygues, FR
***Wind 3, IT
Ice, NO
Vodafone, IT
Síminn, IS
Swisscom, CH
Orange, PL
Telia, NO
Movistar, ES
Vodafone, ES
Telia, SE
Vodafone, IS
Vodafone, UK
T-Mobile, CZ
Vodafone, PT
Vodafone, RO
Telenor, NO
O2, UK
**TIM, IT
Vodafone Ziggo, NL 1)
Vodafone, DE
**Proximus, BE
**Orange, BE
O2, DE
*Telekom, DE
Vodafone, GR
Gbyte per reported SIM per month
FY 2019 1H 2019
*) Calculated as country total minus all other (reporting) operators**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage
***) Calculated as 3 Europe total minus all other 3 operations1) FY 2019 = Q1-Q3 2019
https://tefficient.com/usage-up-but-monetisation-falters/
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 6
political and consumer pressure, the Czech operators in 2019 finally gave in and started to offer premium
unlimited smartphone plans. The allowances on data-only plans were also expanded significantly – but the
home internet plans with unlimited data are no longer offered, so the traffic growth in that segment may
have overwhelmed T-Mobile.
At the other end of the usage growth scale we find Plus/Cyfrowy Polsat from
Poland with just 7%. Little by little, the Polish operators have capped its unlimited
home internet plans and Plus/Cyfrowy Polsat is today no longer offering mobile-based
home internet without a usage cap. And as data-only subscriptions represent a
disproportionate share of the total mobile data traffic, such changes has an immediate
impact on the overall data usage. There are no Polish figures reported to support this,
but in e.g. Austria data-only represented 28% of the non-M2M SIMs but 76% of the
mobile data traffic in 2019.
Some signs of that
Europe’s operators
start to scale back
on unlimited home
internet
https://www.radio.cz/en/section/business/babis-seeks-clarity-from-operators-on-actual-mobile-data-prices
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 7
Asia and China: Taiwan fills the podium – but Malaysia on the move
The three Taiwanese operators FarEasTone, Taiwan Mobile and Chunghwa4 hold the top three usage
positions in Asia and China. Our previous report featured a special section on Taiwan. In short, one could
sum it up saying that dirt cheap unlimited plans drive traffic much more than it drives service revenue.
India’s Jio has been overtaken in our ranking by Digi and Maxis from Malaysia. Celcom, the incumbent, is
number 7 just behind Jio. Unlimited plans are becoming more common in Malaysia driven into the market by
the fourth operator, U Mobile5.
Figure 4. Average data usage per reported SIM per month – Asian and Chinese operators
There are three Asian/Chinese operators with more than 100% growth in the mobile data usage in 2019:
Indosat Indonesia +146%
3 Indonesia +117%
VEON Pakistan +103%
4 The operators aren’t reporting their mobile data traffic themselves; it is being reported by the regulator with a certain delay. There are
two other Taiwanese operators, T Star and Gt, but they are just reported together as ’other’. Their usage is in between Taiwan
Mobile/FarEasTone and Chunghwa. 5 Regretfully not reporting
20,6
20,1
15,5
12,0
11,7
11,4
10,3
9,5
8,3
8,0
7,5
7,0
6,4
5,9
5,4
5,3
5,1
4,6
4,2
3,2
3,2
2,0
1,8
1,7
1,3
1,2
0,9
0,8
0,5
0 5 10 15 20 25 30
FarEasTone, TW
Taiwan Mobile, TW
Chunghwa, TW
**Digi, MY
**Maxis, MY
Jio, IN
Celcom, MY
**LG Uplus, KR
China Unicom, CN
**dtac, TH
AIS, TH
3, ID
China Telecom, CN
China Mobile, CN
Airtel, IN
**Starhub, SG
XL, ID
Indosat, ID
**Singtel, SG
Vodafone Idea, IN
Telkomsel, ID 1)
Smart, PH
Dialog, LK
Globe, PH
**VEON, PK
Robi, BD
**Grameenphone, BD
**Banglalink, BD
Ncell, NP
Gbyte per reported SIM per month
FY 2019 1H 2019
**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage1) FY 2019 = Q1-Q3 2019
https://tefficient.com/mobile-data-operators-1h-2019/
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 8
The slowest growth is with Jio – just 8%. Having said that, Jio is still top-ranked in
India with 11.4 GB per month. That usage is more than double that of Airtel and 3.5x
that of Vodafone Idea. But competition is coming closer: Airtel’s growth was 93% and
Vodafone Idea’s 75%.
Usage generally
grows quickly in
Asia and China
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 9
5G monetisation lessons from China and Korea
Our previous report featured a special section on 5G’s impact on the data usage in Korea. We will provide an
update on that in a bit, but let’s first study some preliminary results from another high-profiled 5G launch in
2019: China.
The Chinese 5G networks were launched in November/December 2019 and Figure 5 shows the subscriber
stats for February.
Figure 5. Reported subscriber bases – total and 5G – for China Unicom and China Telecom, February
China Mobile – with a total of 942 million mobile subscribers – had 15.4 million 5G subscribers in
February, making it the operator with the largest 5G base in the world. China Telecom had 10.7 million 5G
subscriptions, but as China Telecom’s total mobile base is roughly one third of China Mobile’s, China
Telecom’s 5G adoption was actually 3.2% – twice that of China Mobile. The third Chinese operator, China
Unicom – with 318 million mobile subscribers – has yet to report its 5G base.
The Chinese 5G plans are not unlimited, but come with very large data buckets. Most likely, some of these
plans are used by customers not having purchased a 5G handset. It’s not easy to match the time series with
that of e.g. Counterpoint, but the 5G subscriber numbers in China appears to be larger than the number of
942,2
330,4
15,4 10,7
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
700
800
900
1000
China Mobile China Telecom
Mo
bil
e s
ub
scri
pti
on
s, Fe
bru
ary
20
20
[M
]
Total mobile subscriptions
of which 5G
5G: 3,2%5G: 1,6%
https://tefficient.com/mobile-data-operators-1h-2019/https://www.counterpointresearch.com/china-captured-46-global-5g-sales-cy-2019/
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 10
shipped 5G handsets. The Chinese operators are also pointing out that what they report is “mobile
customers who have subscribed to 5G tariff plans”. But the two 5G-reporting operators, China Mobile and
China Telecom, are keen to show that the 5G customers have much higher data usage, see Figure 6.
Figure 6. Development in mobile data usage – Chinese operators
The lines are showing the average mobile data usage per any subscription for the three Chinese operators.
Traffic is reported on a quarterly basis. By the end of 2019, the average Chinese mobile subscription used
about 7 GB per month.
China Mobile reported an average data usage of 16.9 GB per 5G subscriber for December. That’s roughly
three times that of the average China Mobile subscription in Q4 2019. In December, China Mobile only had
2.6 million 5G subscribers (compared to 15.4 million two months later) so one could suspect that the usage
wouldn’t stay at the 16.9 GB level. And we do not of course know what usage the early adopters of 5G had
before they migrated to 5G.
Well actually we do, since China Mobile reported these two before/after figures for February:
Data usage +16.8% vs. pre-migration
ARPU +6.5% vs. pre-migration
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
16
18
Q12018
Q22018
Q32018
Q42018
Q12019
Q22019
Q32019
Q42019
Dec2019
Feb2020
Mo
bil
e d
ata
usa
ge
pe
r su
bscri
pti
on
pe
r m
on
th [
GB
]
China Mobile, 5G
China Telecom, 5G
China Unicom, full base
China Telecom, full base
China Mobile, full base
5G
5G
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 11
So if we trust this, a 5G plan customer had 16.8% higher data usage after having migrated from a 4G plan
to a 5G plan. More importantly, that customer paid 6.5% more. That sounds much better than the
headline of this analysis – 58% more gigabytes generated 0.4% more revenue.
Returning to Figure 6, we can see that also China Telecom dropped a figure for the
data usage among its 5G customers: 13.2 GB for February. That’s roughly double that
of the average China Telecom subscription in Q4 2019. Also here, it led to a like-for-
like increase in ARPU:
ARPU +10% vs. pre-upgrade
Does this mean that any operator should expect to see similar growth rates in ARPU
once 5G is launched? Not necessarily; the Chinese competition logic is different than
that of most other markets. And it doesn’t happen without investments. The Chinese
operators operate sizeable 5G networks:
China Mobile 50k 5G sites by end of December
China Unicom 60k 5G sites by end of February
China Telecom 80k 5G sites by mid-March
Most of the 5G sites operated by China Unicom and China Telecom are shared, but the total number of 5G
sites in China has still surpassed that of the previous rollout leader, South Korea, who had about 110k 5G
sites in total by the end of February.
Over to Korea then. The green line in Figure 7 shows the development in the average usage per 4G
subscription: It has been quite stable at around 9-10 GB per month. The introduction of 5G in April 2019 has
not had any major impact on the average 4G usage.
Chinese operators
report quite
significant ARPU
increase for
customers
upgrading to 5G
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 12
Figure 7. Development in mobile data usage per 4G and 5G subscription – South Korea6
The upper, red, line shows the 5G usage. Most months, it has been three times higher than the 4G usage.
As we mentioned in our previous report, 5G has de facto introduced truly unlimited plans to the general
public in Korea – so thinking that 5G in itself triples usage is incorrect. Or?
Pre-empting the one year anniversary of 5G, SK Telecom reported these before/after figures in March 2020:
Data usage: From 14.5 GB to 28.5 GB (2x)
You can see these two data points to the right in Figure 7. Note that the upgrading customers of SK
Telecom had significantly higher data usage already when in 4G; 14.5 GB vs. the country average of about
9-10 GB. But nevertheless that usage doubled after having moved to 5G. SK Telecom mentions that the
usage of VR, video streaming and gaming increased with 5G. In a previous update, SK Telecom also
mentioned that subscribers spent 37% less time connected to Wi-Fi after the transition to 5G – suggesting
that some 5G subscribers simply toggled Wi-Fi off. That behaviour could rather be driven by the introduction
of unlimited than the introduction of 5G, though.
In October 2019, SK Telecom reported that the doubling of data usage for customers upgrading to 5G had
resulted in a 50% increase in ARPU. It sounds almost too good to be true and perhaps it isn’t any longer
– as SK Telecom didn’t provide an update to it in its one year anniversary release. Looking at Figure 8,
6 As reported by the ministry, MSIT
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
Mar19
Apr19
May19
Jun19
Jul19
Aug19
Sep19
Oct19
Nov19
Dec19
Jan20
Feb20
Mar20
Mo
bil
e d
ata
usa
ge
pe
r su
bscri
pti
on
pe
r m
on
th [
GB
]
SK Telecom: After upgrading to 5G
Korea: 5G
SK Telecom: Before upgrading to 5G
Korea: 4G
https://tefficient.com/mobile-data-operators-1h-2019/https://www.sktelecom.com/en/press/press_detail.do?page.page=1&idx=1451&page.type=all&page.keyword=
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 13
though, we can see that the launch of 5G seems to have helped to lift the overall ARPU into the growth
territory again after two years of y-o-y decline. It’s only LG U+ that still has to pass the zero line.
Figure 8. Development in overall mobile ARPU per operator – South Korea
The number of 5G subscriptions in Korea was 5.4 million by the end of February. That’s 8% of the total
mobile base. 5G’s share of traffic was 23%.
-12%
-10%
-8%
-6%
-4%
-2%
0%
2%
4%
Q2 17 Q3 17 Q4 17 Q1 18 Q2 18 Q3 18 Q4 18 Q1 19 Q2 19 Q3 19 Q4 19
Mo
bil
e A
RP
U e
xcl.
I/C
–Y
-o-Y
tre
nd
SK Telecom KT LG U+
Launch of 5G
Increase in SIM-onlydiscount from 20% to 25%
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 14
RoW: Zain dominates the top
The rest of world ranking combines Latin American and Russian/CIS operators with operators from Middle
East, Africa and reporting international groups, see Figure 9.
Figure 9. Average data usage per reported SIM per month – RoW operators
The world leader, Zain Kuwait, tops this chart. Actually all of the top four operators are Zain operations.
Zain Group is though just ranked as number 6, showing that two Zain operations, Iraq and Sudan, pull that
group average down significantly. Two thirds of the subscriptions in Zain Group are in these two countries.
3 Europe Group is ranked as number five and it’s easy to see why; in the European comparison (Figure 3),
several operations of ‘3’ are top-ranked: Austria, Denmark and Sweden.
Russian and Turkish operators have relatively high usage but the growth has slowed considerably compared
to previous years. The Latin American operators have – with the exception of Chile and Peru – fairly low
average usage.
It is a pity that none of the US or Canadian operators report their data traffic or usage. Otherwise they
would have been in this chart.
27,7
19,4
16,5
13,8
8,1
6,3
5,2
4,8
4,8
4,7
3,6
3,6
3,3
3,1
3,0
2,5
2,2
2,2
1,9
1,9
1,9
1,6
1,4
1,2
1,0
0,8
0,7
0,7
0,5
0,5
4,9
0 5 10 15 20 25 30
Zain, KW
Zain, SA
Zain, BH
Zain, JO
3 Europe, Group
Zain, Group
Vodafone, TR
**MegaFon, RU
**Turkcell, TR
Movistar, CL
MTS, RU (smartphone)
Movistar, PE
**Beeline, RU
**Türk Telekom, TR (4G-only)
**MTN Irancell, IR
**TIM, BR
Telenor, Group
**Kyivstar, UA
Vodafone, Group
Vivo, BR
**Djezzy, DZ
Movistar, AR
Movistar, MX
**Beeline, UZ
Movistar, CO
Vodafone, EG
Zain, IQ
**MTN, ZA
Zain, SD
Vodacom, Group
**MTN, NG
Gbyte per reported SIM per month
FY 2019 1H 2019
**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 15
African operators are – together with Zain Iraq – having the lowest monthly data usage per SIM in our
sample.
There are three RoW operators with more than 100% growth in the mobile data usage in 2019:
Beeline Uzbekistan +123%
Kyivstar Ukraine +120%
Djezzy Algeria +103%
As mentioned earlier, Zain Bahrain has the slowest usage growth rate in the world: 1%.
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 16
China Mobile carried 86% more traffic in 2019 than in 2018
We have seen that the data usage varies much between customers of different operators in different
countries. If we instead compare the total data traffic, the large population differences between the
countries make the spread even wider, see Figure 10.
Figure 10. Total data traffic – all operators
As it’s difficult to read Figure 10 we will in a bit break it down into the three regions of the world, but let’s
first identify the global data traffic leaders – see Figure 11.
0 10000 20000 30000 40000 50000 60000 70000
China Mobile, CN
Jio, IN
China Unicom, CN
China Telecom, CN
Airtel, IN
Vodafone Idea, IN
Vodafone, Group
Telenor, Group
Telkomsel, ID 1)
**MegaFon, RU
MTS, RU (smartphone)
3 Europe, Group
AIS, TH
Zain, Group
XL, ID
Indosat, ID
3, ID
**Beeline, RU
**Turkcell, TR
**dtac, TH
**TIM, BR
Chunghwa, TW
Zain, SA
FarEasTone, TW
Taiwan Mobile, TW
**MTN Irancell, IR
Vivo, BR
Globe, PH
**LG Uplus, KR
**Digi, MY
Smart, PH
***Wind 3, IT
Vodafone, TR
Vodafone, IT
**Maxis, MY
**Bouygues, FR
**Free, FR
Plus Cyfrowy Polsat, PL
Celcom, MY
Play, PL
Elisa, FI
*Telekom, DE
Movistar, ES
**TIM, IT
O2, DE
Orange, PL
**VEON, PK
Zain, KW
*3, UK
3, AT
**Türk Telekom, TR (4G-only)
DNA, FI
O2, UK
Vodafone, DE
**Grameenphone, BD
**Kyivstar, UA
Vodafone, UK
Robi, BD
Vodafone, ES
Zain, JO
Movistar, PE
*Telia, FI
Vodacom, Group
Movistar, MX
Movistar, CL
Vodafone, EG
Swisscom, CH
Movistar, AR
**MTN, NG
Tele2, SE
**Djezzy, DZ
Vodafone, RO
TDC, DK
**Banglalink, BD
Telenor, SE
Dialog, LK
Telia, SE
**MTN, ZA
Movistar, CO
T-Mobile, CZ
3, SE
**Singtel, SG
3, DK
Telia, DK
Vodafone, PT
Tele2, LT
Zain, IQ
Telenor, NO
**Beeline, UZ
**Starhub, SG
Zain, BH
**Proximus, BE
Telenor, DK
Telia, NO
Zain, SD
Telia, LT
Vodafone Ziggo, NL 1)
**Orange, BE
Ncell, NP
Bite, LT
Vodafone, GR
Ice, NO
Nova, IS
Síminn, IS
Vodafone, IS
Mobile data traffic [Petabyte]
FY 2019 1H 2019
*) Calculated as country total minus all other (reporting) operators**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage
***) Calculated as 3 Europe total minus all other 3 operations1) FY 2019 = Q1-Q3 2019
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 17
Figure 11. Total data traffic – top 13 operators
China Mobile has 950 million mobile subscribers and is now, by far, the largest operator
in the world in mobile data traffic. Its total handset traffic grew 86% from 2018 to 2019.
The Indian challenger Jio is now the operator with the largest subscriber base in India – 370 million.
The data traffic growth in 2019 was 60%. Airtel India had a traffic growth of 91% whereas the
struggling Vodafone Idea only had 54%. As shown in the previous section on usage, Jio’s usage per
subscription didn’t grow much in 2019 – just 8%.
China Unicom is the Chinese operator with the highest average usage per subscription. Relative
to China Mobile, Unicom’s subscription base is small, though: Just 318 million. Even China
Telecom has a larger base now (336 million). The total handset data traffic of Unicom grew slower than
China Mobile’s and China Telecom’s: 46% in 2019.
Note that Vodafone Group (excluding India) only comes in as number 7 even though it consists of about
20 countries. It says something about the size of the Chinese and Indian operations.
65890
44560
31621
24370
18273
13452
7192
5500
4786
4397
4054
3753
29830
20460
14603
10896
7897
6170
3179
3032
2226
1937
1845
1771
China Mobile, CN
Jio, IN
China Unicom, CN
China Telecom, CN
Airtel, IN
Vodafone Idea, IN
Vodafone, Group
Telenor, Group
Telkomsel, ID 1)
**MegaFon, RU
MTS, RU (smartphone)
3 Europe, Group
AIS, TH
Mobile data traffic [Petabyte]
FY 2019 1H 2019
**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage1) FY 2019 = Q1-Q3 2019
1
2
3
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 18
Europe: Italy, France and Poland take the first six positions
First to the European breakdown. Since the highest ranked European operator is just number 32 in our
global rank, we could generally conclude that the European countries are less populated than the global
leaders – but also that growth is significantly faster outside of Europe. And it’s not the operators that you
necessarily would suspect (with the largest SIM base) that are in the top of Figure 12.
Figure 12. Total data traffic – European operators
The Italian operator Wind 3 is likely7 Europe’s largest operator in total data traffic. Vodafone Italy is the
runner-up. Italy has had an explosion in mobile data usage ever since the new fourth operator, Iliad,
launched 30 GB for 5.99 EUR in May 2018 – and all of competition copied.
7 CK Hutchison has taken over the full ownership of Wind 3 and as it was their previous shareholder VEON that reported data usage, we
miss input from Wind 3. In this analysis we have assigned the residual traffic of 3 Europe Group after having subtracted the calculated
traffic of UK, Denmark, Austria, Sweden and Ireland. When the Italian regulator reports the total mobile data traffic for Italy for 2019,
we should be able to check this calculation vs. the residual traffic of Italy – as TIM and Vodafone Italy report their traffic and Iliad’s
traffic on its own network (beyond national roaming) should have been limited in 2019.
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 1400 1600 1800
***Wind 3, IT
Vodafone, IT
**Bouygues, FR
**Free, FR
Plus Cyfrowy Polsat, PL
Play, PL
Elisa, FI
*Telekom, DE
Movistar, ES
**TIM, IT
O2, DE
Orange, PL
*3, UK
3, AT
DNA, FI
O2, UK
Vodafone, DE
Vodafone, UK
Vodafone, ES
*Telia, FI
Swisscom, CH
Tele2, SE
Vodafone, RO
TDC, DK
Telenor, SE
Telia, SE
T-Mobile, CZ
3, SE
3, DK
Telia, DK
Vodafone, PT
Tele2, LT
Telenor, NO
**Proximus, BE
Telenor, DK
Telia, NO
Telia, LT
Vodafone Ziggo, NL 1)
**Orange, BE
Bite, LT
Vodafone, GR
Ice, NO
Nova, IS
Síminn, IS
Vodafone, IS
Mobile data traffic [Petabyte]
FY 2019 1H 2019
*) Calculated as country total minus all other (reporting) operators**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage
***) Calculated as 3 Europe total minus all other 3 operations1) FY 2019 = Jan-Sep 2019
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 19
The two French operators Bouygues and Free follow8. The two Polish operators Plus/Cyfrowy Polsat
and Play come in as number 5 and 6 whereas the relative base midget Elisa (with 4.1 million subs) finishes
seventh.
The operators with the fastest traffic growth in Europe are:
T-Mobile Czech Republic +307%
Telia Lithuania +73%
Vodafone Italy +70%
Orange Belgium +67%
Bite Lithuania +65%
It’s interesting to note that with the exception of Vodafone Portugal, the European
operators with the slowest traffic growth in 2019 are operators that are or have been
renowned for unlimited:
Swisscom Switzerland +25%
DNA Finland +23%
Free France +22%
Elisa Finland +21%
Vodafone Portugal +17%
Telia Finland +16%
Plus/Cyfrowy Polsat Poland +10%
8 Orange and SFR could have been high-ranked as well, but neither are reporting data traffic or usage
The European
operators
renowned for
unlimited had quite
slow traffic growth
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 20
Asia and China: Quick traffic growth
We find the six global traffic leaders in the top of the Asian/Chinese comparison: China Mobile, Jio, China
Unicom, China Telecom, Airtel and Vodafone Idea. The 2018 to 2019 growth rates are high for all
these operators (46-91%).
Figure 13. Total data traffic – Asian and Chinese operators
The Indonesian operators (Telkomsel9, XL, Indosat and ‘3’) and the Thai operators (AIS, dtac) follow.
Although not matching the traffic growth of most of the Chinese and Indian operators, the Indonesian
operators are still experiencing pretty fast traffic growth:
Indosat Indonesia +72%
XL Indonesia +51%
3 Indonesia +41%
Faster still is the traffic growth of VEON Pakistan (+115%), Smart Philippines
(+96%) and Robi Bangladesh (+95%). Airtel India isn’t far behind with 91%,
Banglalink Bangladesh with 88% and, not to forget, China Mobile with 86%.
9 Represented with its Jan-Sep 2019 traffic for FY 2019 as Q4 2019 hasn’t yet been reported
0 10000 20000 30000 40000 50000 60000 70000
China Mobile, CN
Jio, IN
China Unicom, CN
China Telecom, CN
Airtel, IN
Vodafone Idea, IN
Telkomsel, ID 1)
AIS, TH
XL, ID
Indosat, ID
3, ID
**dtac, TH
Chunghwa, TW
FarEasTone, TW
Taiwan Mobile, TW
Globe, PH
**LG Uplus, KR
**Digi, MY
Smart, PH
**Maxis, MY
Celcom, MY
**VEON, PK
**Grameenphone, BD
Robi, BD
**Banglalink, BD
Dialog, LK
**Singtel, SG
**Starhub, SG
Ncell, NP
Mobile data traffic [Petabyte]
FY 2019 1H 2019
**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage1) FY 2019 = Q1-Q3 2019
Fastest traffic
growth in Pakistan,
Philippines and
Bangladesh – but
India/China close
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 21
RoW: MegaFon larger than 3 Europe Group and Zain Group
Figure 14 collects operators from the rest of the world, but also a few reporting international groups.
Figure 14. Total data traffic – Rest of world operators
Vodafone Group and Telenor Group are number 1 and 2 in this RoW ranking. The other two groups, 3
Europe and Zain, are ranked as number 5 and 6.
MegaFon has regretfully stopped reporting data usage and is therefore represented with its last reported
1H 2019 traffic.
The Russian competitor MTS shadows whereas Beeline (#7) has a significantly lower traffic. Turkish,
Brazilian and Saudi operators follow – together with MTN Irancell.
The operators with the fastest growth in mobile data traffic in 2019 are:
Kyivstar Ukraine +119%
Beeline Uzbekistan +105%
Djezzy Algeria +101%
Slowest growth? Zain Bahrain – just 4%.
0 1000 2000 3000 4000 5000 6000 7000 8000
Vodafone, Group
Telenor, Group
**MegaFon, RU
MTS, RU (smartphone)
3 Europe, Group
Zain, Group
**Beeline, RU
**Turkcell, TR
**TIM, BR
Zain, SA
**MTN Irancell, IR
Vivo, BR
Vodafone, TR
Zain, KW
**Türk Telekom, TR (4G-only)
**Kyivstar, UA
Zain, JO
Movistar, PE
Vodacom, Group
Movistar, MX
Movistar, CL
Vodafone, EG
Movistar, AR
**MTN, NG
**Djezzy, DZ
**MTN, ZA
Movistar, CO
Zain, IQ
**Beeline, UZ
Zain, BH
Zain, SD
Mobile data traffic [Petabyte]
FY 2019 1H 2019
**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 22
How much money can you make on mobile data?
The way we calculate revenue per gigabyte – total mobile service revenue per carried gigabyte – will
resonate with mature markets where operators generally aren’t attempting to monetise voice and SMS
based on usage. Instead they have made voice and messaging allowances unlimited and included them in a
flat fee.
In maturing markets, usage-based monetisation is still used to a higher degree. This is true also for voice
and messaging. With our calculation method, one might think that the operators ending up with the highest
effective revenue per gigabyte would thus be operators from maturing markets. You do find three African
operators in the lower parts of Figure 15 accompanied by Zain Iraq – but otherwise the operators with the
highest revenue per GB are from six European countries: Greece, Belgium, Norway, Germany, the
Netherlands and Switzerland.
Figure 15. Total mobile service revenue per gigabyte – all operators10
10 That also report mobile service revenue
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16
Jio, IN
Airtel, IN
3, ID
Indosat, ID
Vodafone Idea, IN
XL, ID
**MTN Irancell, IR
DNA, FI
China Unicom, CN
Taiwan Mobile, TW
FarEasTone, TW
3, AT
**Digi, MY
Zain, JO
**MegaFon, RU
Elisa, FI
Chunghwa, TW
Telkomsel, ID 1)
**dtac, TH
China Telecom, CN
Smart, PH
AIS, TH
MTS, RU (smartphone)
**Kyivstar, UA
Zain, BH
China Mobile, CN
Tele2, LT
Zain, SA
**Maxis, MY
Zain, KW
Telia, LT
Globe, PH
Orange, PL
Celcom, MY
Play, PL
Vodafone, TR
Robi, BD
**VEON, PK
Movistar, PE
**Beeline, RU
Zain, Group
*Telia, FI
3, DK
**Banglalink, BD
Bite, LT
Telenor, Group
**Beeline, UZ
**Türk Telekom, TR (4G-only)
Movistar, CL
**Free, FR
Telia, DK
***Wind 3, IT
**TIM, BR
Movistar, MX
**Grameenphone, BD
Dialog, LK
TDC, DK
**Djezzy, DZ
3, SE
3 Europe, Group
Vodafone, RO
*3, UK
Telenor, SE
Zain, SD
**Bouygues, FR
Tele2, SE
**LG Uplus, KR
Telenor, DK
Vodafone, IT
Vodafone, EG
Movistar, AR
Movistar, CO
T-Mobile, CZ
Vivo, BR
**Starhub, SG
Vodafone, Group
Ice, NO
Vodafone, ES
**TIM, IT
Telia, SE
**Singtel, SG
Ncell, NP
Vodafone, UK
O2, DE
O2, UK
Vodafone, PT
Swisscom, CH
Telia, NO
Vodafone, DE
*Telekom, DE
Zain, IQ
Vodafone Ziggo, NL 1)
**MTN, NG
Vodacom, Group
**Proximus, BE
**MTN, ZA
Telenor, NO
**Orange, BE
Vodafone, GR
Total mobile service revenue per Gbyte [EUR]
FY 2019 1H 2019*) Calculated as country total minus all other (reporting) operators
**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage***) Calculated as 3 Europe total minus all other 3 operations
1) FY 2019 = Q1-Q3 2019
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 23
We will – for readability reasons – soon break Figure 15 down into Europe, Asia/China and RoW, but let’s
first look into a disclaimer with regards to operators marked with * or **.
Having explained this, let’s now in Figure 15 identify the ten operators that get the lowest total mobile
service revenue per gigabyte in the world:
1H 2019 FY 2019
1. Jio, India 0.1 EUR 0.1 EUR
2. Airtel, India 0.3 EUR 0.3 EUR
3. 3, Indonesia 0.3 EUR 0.3 EUR
4. Indosat, Indonesia 0.5 EUR 0.4 EUR
5. Vodafone Idea, India 0.5 EUR 0.4 EUR
6. XL, Indonesia 0.4 EUR 0.4 EUR
7. MTN Irancell, Iran** 0.6 EUR 0.6 EUR
8. DNA, Finland 0.6 EUR 0.6 EUR
9. China Unicom, China 0.7 EUR 0.6 EUR
10. Taiwan Mobile, Taiwan 0.7 EUR 0.7 EUR
When reporting mobile data traffic, take inspiration from Vodafone and Telefónica
Most graphs in this analysis carry this legend:
*) Data traffic calculated as country total minus all other (reporting) operators
**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage
There are a number of operators globally that, in their regular easy-to-use Excel sheets, report their total mobile data traffic
quarter by quarter. Of the larger operators groups, Vodafone and Telefónica are two good examples. We encourage all
operators to follow their example.
Some operators are instead reporting – or occasionally indicating – data usage. These are the operators marked with **. The
problem here is that many operators aren’t defining what a user is – sometimes it is all users, sometimes “active data users”
(whatever that is), sometimes smartphone users, sometimes branded smartphone users, sometimes postpaid users, sometimes
4G users. Typically these usage numbers are stated to impress, i.e. they are representative only for a smaller, high-usage,
segment of the subscriber base. Exceptions to that operators reporting usage aren’t reporting the number of associated users are
e.g. VEON Group, MTN Group and AIS that report the usage per mobile data customer and the number of such mobile data
customers (a subset of the total customer base). Well done.
The majority of operators are still not reporting anything, though. Orange Group and Telia Company are examples of it. And, of
course, all North American carriers. In some cases, country regulators are helpful in reporting a breakdown per operator. But in
most cases, the country regulator is just reporting a total. In such occasions – and if also all other operators report data traffic or
at least usage – we have calculated the country residual and assumed that this traffic equals that of the non-reporting operator.
These are the operators marked with *.
It’s not necessarily so that a regulator and the reporting operators use exactly the same definition when reporting data traffic.
Traffic via MVNOs can e.g. disturb the comparability. Where the error risks to be the largest, though, is in countries where the
country residual has been assigned to a *-marked operator while, at the same time, one or several of the other operators are **-
marked operators, i.e. have not explicitly reported the total data traffic but some type of usage.
So if any operator (*-marked or **-marked) is unhappy with its calculated data traffic, the solution is simple: Start to report your
total mobile data traffic.
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 24
These operators are either active in mature high data usage markets (Finland, Taiwan) or in highly
competitive maturing markets (India, Indonesia).
The ten operators that get the highest total mobile service revenue per gigabyte in the world are:
1H 2019 FY 2019
1. Vodafone, Greece 14.0 EUR 11.6 EUR
2. Orange, Belgium** 11.3 EUR 10.8 EUR
3. Telenor, Norway 8.7 EUR n/a
4. MTN, South Africa** 8.7 EUR 8.7 EUR
5. Proximus, Belgium** 9.2 EUR 8.7 EUR
6. Vodacom, Group 8.8 EUR 8.0 EUR
7. MTN, Nigeria** 8.4 EUR 7.9 EUR
8. Vodafone Ziggo, Netherlands 1) 8.0 EUR 7.1 EUR 1) FY 2019=Q1-Q3 2019
9. Zain, Iraq n/a 6.4 EUR
10. Telekom, Germany* 11 n/a 6.3 EUR
In our mature market focused country analysis you can identify Belgium, Germany, Greece, Norway and the
Netherlands as some of the country markets (of the covered) with the highest revenue per gigabyte so this
list seems plausible.
We conclude that there in 2019 there was 83x difference between the operator with the highest total
service revenue per gigabyte (Vodafone Greece) and the operator with the lowest (Jio India).
11 Since Telekom doesn’t report mobile data traffic, but the two competitors O2 and Vodafone both do, we have calculated Telekom’s
traffic as the country residual. The regulator BNetzA has not yet reported the final mobile data traffic figure for 2019, though – just a
preliminary figure. If the final figure deviates significantly, Telekom’s position will change.
https://tefficient.com/usage-up-but-monetisation-falters/
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 25
Europe: Wide spread in the revenue per GB
Figure 16 shows the European breakdown. Since European operators played both in the bottom and in top
of the global chart, the spread is almost as large as in the global view. To ease comparability, the scale is
kept intact throughout this section.
Figure 16. Total mobile service revenue per gigabyte – European operators
As pointed out in the global section, Greek, Belgian, Norwegian, German, Dutch and Swiss operators play in
the bottom of the graph – where the total service revenue per consumed gigabyte is high. In the other end
of the scale – where the revenue per gigabyte is low – we find operators from Finland, Austria, Lithuania
and Poland.
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16
DNA, FI
3, AT
Elisa, FI
Tele2, LT
Telia, LT
Orange, PL
Play, PL
*Telia, FI
3, DK
Bite, LT
**Free, FR
Telia, DK
***Wind 3, IT
TDC, DK
3, SE
Vodafone, RO
*3, UK
Telenor, SE
**Bouygues, FR
Tele2, SE
Telenor, DK
Vodafone, IT
T-Mobile, CZ
Ice, NO
Vodafone, ES
**TIM, IT
Telia, SE
Vodafone, UK
O2, DE
O2, UK
Vodafone, PT
Swisscom, CH
Telia, NO
Vodafone, DE
*Telekom, DE
Vodafone Ziggo, NL 1)
**Proximus, BE
Telenor, NO
**Orange, BE
Vodafone, GR
Total mobile service revenue per Gbyte [EUR]
FY 2019 1H 2019
*) Calculated as country total minus all other (reporting) operators**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage
***) Calculated as 3 Europe total minus all other 3 operations1) FY 2019 = Q1-Q3 2019
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 26
Asia and China: Revenue per GB decreasing, but not as fast as before
Figure 17 shows the Asian and Chinese operators. Indian and Indonesian operators have the lowest revenue
per gigabyte whereas no operator is having very high revenue.
Figure 17. Total mobile service revenue per gigabyte – Asian and Chinese operators
The erosion in revenue per gigabyte in Asia/China is no longer as quick as it has been in our previous
reports. In most cases, data usage has reached new highs – of these operators, only Bangladesh’s
Banglalink and Grameenphone plus Nepal’s Ncell were below 1 GB per SIM per month in 2019.
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16
Jio, IN
Airtel, IN
3, ID
Indosat, ID
Vodafone Idea, IN
XL, ID
China Unicom, CN
Taiwan Mobile, TW
FarEasTone, TW
**Digi, MY
Chunghwa, TW
Telkomsel, ID 1)
**dtac, TH
China Telecom, CN
Smart, PH
AIS, TH
China Mobile, CN
**Maxis, MY
Globe, PH
Celcom, MY
Robi, BD
**VEON, PK
**Banglalink, BD
**Grameenphone, BD
Dialog, LK
**LG Uplus, KR
**Starhub, SG
**Singtel, SG
Ncell, NP
Total mobile service revenue per Gbyte [EUR]
FY 2019 1H 2019
**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage1) FY 2019 = Q1-Q3 2019
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 27
RoW: Big drop in revenue per GB in certain maturing markets
We are ending this section with Figure 18 – showing the operators in the rest of the world alongside a few
groups that separate out mobile service revenue in their reporting.
Figure 18. Total mobile service revenue per gigabyte – rest of world operators
MTN Irancell, Russian operators, Kyivstar from Ukraine and Zain’s Middle East operations dominate the top
of the chart where revenues are the lowest per gigabyte. Latin American operators clutter the middle of the
chart whereas sub-Saharan operators populate the bottom of the graph.
Beeline Uzbekistan, MTN Irancell, Movistar in Peru and Mexico and Djezzy from Algeria had very significant
drops in the revenue per gigabyte in 2019.
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16
**MTN Irancell, IR
Zain, JO
**MegaFon, RU
MTS, RU (smartphone)
**Kyivstar, UA
Zain, BH
Zain, SA
Zain, KW
Vodafone, TR
Movistar, PE
**Beeline, RU
Zain, Group
Telenor, Group
**Beeline, UZ
**Türk Telekom, TR (4G-only)
Movistar, CL
**TIM, BR
Movistar, MX
**Djezzy, DZ
3 Europe, Group
Zain, SD
Vodafone, EG
Movistar, AR
Movistar, CO
Vivo, BR
Vodafone, Group
Zain, IQ
**MTN, NG
Vodacom, Group
**MTN, ZA
Total mobile service revenue per Gbyte [EUR]
FY 2019 1H 2019
**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 28
The revenue per GB vs. usage chart
Let us now combine the revenue per gigabyte with the usage. Those of you that have read our data usage
and revenue analyses before are familiar with the revenue per GB vs. usage chart, see Figure 19.
Figure 19. Mobile data usage vs. total mobile service revenue per Gbyte
With all those markers, we have only been able to highlight the operators that have more extreme positions.
The amber line is not a regression line, but illustrates where 15 EUR of ARPU is earned. Operators above the
line earn more – and operators below the line less than 15 EUR.
Most mature markets operators operate with an APRU of around 15 EUR. Many operators in maturing
markets clutter in the southwest or south parts of the chart.
Elisa, FI
*Telia, FI
DNA, FI
*Telekom, DEVodafone, DE
O2, DE
3, AT
T-Mobile, CZ Vodafone, UKO2, UK
*3, UKPlay, PL
**Proximus, BE **Orange, BE
Vodafone, IT
**TIM, IT Vodafone Ziggo, NL 1)Vodafone, RO
Vodafone, GR
**Bouygues, FRSwisscom, CH
Bite, LT
Vodafone, EG
Zain, KW
Zain, BH
Zain, SA
Zain, JO
Zain, IQ **MTN, ZA
Movistar, CL
Movistar, CO
**Maxis, MY
Celcom, MY
**Singtel, SG
**Starhub, SG
**LG Uplus, KR
FarEasTone, TW
Chunghwa, TW
Taiwan Mobile, TW
Vodafone, GroupTelenor, Group
3 Europe, Group
Vodacom, GroupNcell, NP
Vodafone Idea, IN
Airtel, IN
Jio, IN
Robi, BD
Indosat, ID
3, ID
China Unicom, CN
Smart, PHGlobe, PH
**Digi, MY
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
0 5 10
Gb
yte
pe
r re
po
rte
d S
IM a
nd
mo
nth
, FY
20
19
Total mobile service revenue per Gbyte, FY 2019 [EUR]
15 EUR ARPU line
*) Data traffic calculated as country total minus all other (reporting) operators**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage***) Calculated as 3 Europe total minus all other 3 operations1) FY 2019 = Q1-Q3 2019
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 29
The ARPU vs. usage chart
One could criticise the previous chart for comparing the number of gigabytes with something that relates to
it – the revenue per gigabyte. Our next chart, Figure 20, is therefore comparing the number of gigabytes
with the revenue per subscription, i.e. the ARPU. And that is perhaps even more interesting.
Figure 20. Mobile data usage vs. total mobile service revenue per SIM
Of all the operators there are three12 – Swisscom, Zain Kuwait and LG Uplus – that enjoy much higher
total mobile service revenue per SIM than all other operators. In the case of Zain the data consumption is
also very high – highest in the world. Swisscom’s subscribers – although many are on speed-tiered unlimited
plans – are not using particularly much data, but the ARPU is the highest in this group of reporting operators.
In the middle top of the graph there is a cluster of operators with very high average data usage but
moderate ARPU of about 15-20 EUR. Here we find the Finnish and the Taiwanese operators together with
Drei (3) Austria and Zain in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.
12 Of the operators that have reported data usage and mobile service revenue in 2019
Elisa, FI
*Telia, FI
DNA, FI
*Telekom, DEO2, DE
3, AT
T-Mobile, CZVodafone, UKO2, UK
*3, UKPlay, PL
**Proximus, BE **Orange, BE
Vodafone, IT***Wind 3, IT
Vodafone, ES
Vodafone Ziggo, NL 1)
Vodafone, GR
**Free, FR
**Bouygues, FRSwisscom, CH
Bite, LT
**Türk Telekom, TR (4G-only)
Vodafone, TR
Zain, KW
Zain, BH
Zain, SA
Zain, JO
**MTN, NG**MTN, ZA
Movistar, CL
Vivo, BR
**Maxis, MY
Celcom, MY
**Singtel, SG
**Starhub, SG
**LG Uplus, KR
FarEasTone, TW
Chunghwa, TW
Taiwan Mobile, TW
3 Europe, Group
Vodafone Idea, IN
**Banglalink, BD
Airtel, IN
Jio, IN
XL, ID
Robi, BD
Indosat, ID
3, ID
China Unicom, CN
Smart, PHGlobe, PH
AIS, TH**dtac, TH
**Digi, MY
R² = 0,28
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35
Gb
yte
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r re
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d S
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nd
mo
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, FY
20
19
Total mobile service revenue per SIM and month, FY 2019 [EUR]
15 EUR ARPU line*) Data traffic calculated as country total minus all other (reporting) operators**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage***) Calculated as 3 Europe total minus all other 3 operations1) FY 2019 = Q1-Q3 2019
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 30
And then there’s Jio. Its ARPU isn’t the lowest, but considering an average data usage above 11 GB per
month, Jio is the clear affordability leader of the world.
The grey regression line suggests that operators with higher data usage have
higher ARPU.
To moderate this, one has to realise that the adherence to this line (shown by a R2
value below 1) isn’t perfect. And we should also remember that the line visualises an
international – not a national – trend: It is quite difficult to find national examples
showing that operators with higher data usage enjoy higher ARPU. If anything, it’s
rather the opposite. It’s typically the challenger operator that has the customers with
the highest data usage and challenger operators tend to have lower ARPU than
incumbents.
International trend:
Operators with
higher data usage
tend to have higher
ARPU
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 31
Dressing the Christmas tree
Absolute ARPU aside, how many of the operators have been able to deliver on
“more for more” i.e. been able to increase ARPU while increasing data usage? And
how many are just following the “more for less” stream, giving users more data but
not being able to charge anything more?
This isn’t the prettiest Christmas tree you’ve seen, but it is at least relatively well
balanced: When data usage increased, 44% of operators could grow ARPU
(with branches growing to the right) – 56% could not.
Figure 21. Mobile data usage development vs. ARPU13 development – 2018 to 2019
Let’s highlight a few best practices of successful “more for more” operators:
13 ARPU is calculated as the reported total mobile service (non-equipment) revenue incl. interconnect & roaming divided with the
average number of reported SIMs. It can differ from the definition of operator reported ARPU.
Elisa, FI
*Telia, FI
DNA, FI
3, AT
*3, UK
Orange, PL
**TIM, ITVodafone, RO
Vodafone, GR
**Free, FR
Bite, LT
MTS, RU (smartphone)Vodafone, TR
**Kyivstar, UA
Vodafone, EG
Zain, KW
Zain, BH
Zain, SA
Zain, JO
Zain, IQ
**MTN Irancell, IR
Movistar, AR
Movistar, PE
**Maxis, MY
Celcom, MY
**Singtel, SG
**LG Uplus, KR
FarEasTone, TW
Chunghwa, TW
Taiwan Mobile, TW
Ncell, NP
Airtel, IN
Jio, IN
Telkomsel, ID 1)
Robi, BD
Indosat, ID
3, IDChina Telecom, CN
China Unicom, CN
China Mobile, CN
Globe, PH
**Digi, MY
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
-40% -20% 0% 20% 40% 60% 80%
Gb
yte
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Total mobile service revenue per SIM and month dev. 2018-2019 [local currency]
FY 2019
FY 2018
Decreasing ARPU Increasing ARPU
*) Calculated as country total minus all other (reporting) operators**) Data traffic not reported, but calculated based on reported usage***) Calculated as 3 Europe total minus all other 3 operations1) FY 2019 = Q1-Q3 2019
Data usage grew
for 100% of
operators
ARPU grew for
44% of operators
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 32
The Finnish operators DNA and, to a lesser extent, Telia have been able to grow ARPU thanks to
more and more customers upgrading to faster (and more expensive) speed tiers on their unlimited
plans. Based on its reported service revenue (which includes Estonia), Elisa was just below zero.
Zain in Saudi Arabia could increase revenues in 2019 in spite of a fall in subscriber base. The
company launched a large-scale 5G network in October 2019.
Celcom in Malaysia managed to turn the usage growth into ARPU growth when the two local
competitors Maxis and Digi could not.
Free in France isn’t growing its total mobile base any longer – but are gradually increasing the share
of customers who subscribe to their premium unlimited 4G14 plans, thereby lifting ARPU. Local
competitor Bouygues is also growing its data usage, but with a falling ARPU.
All three Lithuanian operators Tele2, Telia and Bite could once again turn usage growth into ARPU
growth.
India’s Airtel experienced the most disruptive entrant ever, Jio, but has now managed to turn the
expansion in mobile data usage into APRU growth. Airtel has fared much better than its competitor
Vodafone Idea even though also Vodafone Idea also had a bit of ARPU growth. Note that Jio’s ARPU
is now in decline.
3 and Indosat in Indonesia had a massive ARPU expansion but the main reason is the mandatory
SIM registration in Indonesia in 2018 that halved the subscription bases of the two operators. In
spite of this, 3 and Indosat could still grow revenue y-o-y which suggests that most of these
disconnected non-registered SIMs were not generating much revenue. Telkomsel is also on the
right side of the Christmas tree based on its reported Q1-Q3 2019 data.
We do not mention Movistar in Argentina as the development mainly is due to hyperinflation.
56% of the operators are on the branches facing left. They had data usage growth, but anyhow a decline
in ARPU. There are a few operators standing out quite negatively here:
Taiwan where the three incumbent mobile operators FarEasTone, Taiwan Mobile and Chunghwa all
continued to experience decreasing ARPU in spite of growing data usage.
All the three Chinese operators – China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom – have
experienced significant growth in data usage while ARPU has been falling 8% to 10%.
Finally MTN Irancell where data usage grew but ARPU collapsed when further sanctions worsened
the country’s financial crisis.
The fact that less than half (44%) of the operators managed to turn data usage growth into APRU growth is
regretfully a deterioration compared to our Christmas tree graph for the first half of 2019 – in which a
majority, for the first time, could grow ARPU. Let’s hope that our 1H 2020 analysis – supported by 5G –
could show an improvement. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic might have unforeseen consequences,
though.
14 Unlimited in conjunction with a Freebox (triple-play) subscription – otherwise limited to 50 or 100 GB
tefficient AB www.tefficient.com 14 April 2020 33
Conclusion
In this analysis, we have presented fourteen updated ranking charts and two correlation plots and
we hope these are useful for you in understanding how mobile data usage, traffic and service
revenues are developing globally. Generally speaking, data usage and traffic grow – while service
revenue is flat. If summing up all our studied operators, they carried 58% more gigabytes in
2019 compared to 2018 – but only generated 0.4% more revenue. It’s remarkable that a
product that is so much in demand can’t be monetised better.
Our special section this time focused on how 5G affects data usage and ARPU in China and
South Korea. Let’s see if this extends to the rest of the world – but according to Chinese and
Korean operators, 5G customers use much more data after having upgraded from 4G. Better
news still: Figures from China speak about ARPU increasing 6.5% or 10% for upgrading
customers. And in Korea, 5G – although just adopted by 8% of the subscribers – has been a factor
behind the turnaround in total market ARPU. After two years of y-o-y decline, ARPU rose again in
Q4.
Our beloved Christmas tree
graph shows that data
usage grows for all
operators – but that less
than half of these operators
have been able to turn that
into ARPU growth; 44%
delivered on a “more for
more” promise. They
proved their capability to
monetise an increasing
mobile data usage.
How do you do that? Well,
there are many initiatives
tried out – unlimited, zero-rating, rollover, speed/video/priority tiers, inclusive content, FMC, all-
digital brands – and, of course, 5G. As specialists in mobile data monetisation, we can help you to
understand what works.
International telco competitiveness specialist providing operators and suppliers with analysis, benchmarks and go-to-
market preparation. Expertise in data monetisation, customer loyalty, Nonstop Retention®, FMC, mobile video, fibre, Wi-
Fi and 5G business models.
www.tefficient.com
Elisa, FI
*Telia, FI
DNA, FI
3, AT
*3, UK
Orange, PL
**TIM, ITVodafone, RO
Vodafone, GR
**Free, FR
Bite, LT
MTS, RU (smartphone)Vodafone, TR
**Kyivstar, UA
Vodafone, EG
Zain, KW
Zain, BH
Zain, SA
Zain, JO
Zain, IQ
**MTN Irancell, IR
Movistar, AR
Movistar, PE
**Maxis, MY
Celcom, MY
**Singtel, SG
**LG Uplus, KR
FarEasTone, TW
Chunghwa, TW
Taiwan Mobile, TW
Ncell, NP
Airtel, IN
Jio, IN
Telkomsel, ID 1)
Robi, BD
Indosat, ID
3, IDChina Telecom, CN
China Unicom, CN
China Mobile, CN
Globe, PH
**Digi, MY
0
5
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-40% -20% 0% 20% 40% 60% 80%
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Total mobile service revenue per SIM and month dev. 2018-2019 [local currency]
Decreasing ARPU Increasing ARPU
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