Oi
- By the end of July, Oi expects to receive proposals for Oi Mobile from Vivo, TIM and Claro. The three companies have already started their diligence at the company. The value would be between R$ 14 billion and R$ 19 billion. (Valor Econômico)
- Rodrigo Abreu stated at the online event of Aliança Conecta Brasil F4 that fiber is a central element of Oi's strategic plan. In 2020 more than R$ 4 billion will be invested in fiber networks (50% of Capex), in 2019 it was R$ 3 billion (39% of Capex);
- Oi, as a concessionaire, will still have to invest around R$ 1 billion in fixed telephony in 2020;
- This week Oi announces its 1Q20 results;
- Oi's ON shares appreciated by + 6.7% in the week and PN shares by + 3.0%.
5G
The president of Anatel admitted that the launch of the 5G announcement may happen in 2021. Among the reasons, there is the dispute regarding the interference in the TV receivers of the satellite dishes. Anatel studies recommend that:
- Assess the possibility of establishing a guard band between the two 20 MHz systems (or 40 MHz dynamics), which would reduce the amount of spectrum bid;
- Develop more selective filters for TV receivers, since the commercially available devices did not perform as expected.
This week, Teleco publishes SindiSat's contribution to the public consultation of the 5G frequency announcement in the “On Debate” section.
New OpenSignal's study comparing the performance of 10 operators in the world confirms the results of previous measurements:
- Verizon (US), which uses only millimeter waves, has the highest speed (506 Mbps), but the 5G smartphone can stay connected in 5G (availability) only 0.5% of the time;
- T-Mobile (US), which operates at 600 MHz, has the lowest speed (47 Mbps), but the highest availability (19.8% of the time);
- At SK (Korea), which operates at 3.5GHz, the speed of 5G is 221 MHz and the availability of 15.4% of the time.
Six months after the start of its 5G operations, China Mobile and China Telecom ended April with a combined total for 65.5 million 5G phones. In 2019 there were 18 million 5G phones in the world.
Huawei
- This week I participated in the Huawei Analyst Summit (HAS) that took place online this year. Great opportunity to follow the development of 5G and its applications. The focus of the debates was on applications for the B2B market, with the presentation of real use cases for the use of 5G and 5G LAN private networks that replace WiFi networks and cables in factories;
- The US “announced new rules that target the microchips designed by Huawei, which power many of the company's products. The rules are directed at the factories that transform these projects into silicon, such as those owned by TSMC in Taiwan and SMIC in China. They establish that no American tool can be used to manufacture Huawei products. As every chip maker uses some American tools, the effect would be to freeze Huawei completely.” (Economist);
- These restrictions are unlikely to affect Huawei in the short term due to the large amount of components in stock. In the long run, this measure will lead to a less efficient industry divided into two blocks. In the end everyone loses.
Results 1Q20
Algar's gross revenue grew 11.6% in 1Q20, when compared to 1Q19. B2B's revenue grew 13.3% and B2C's in its concession area 9.1%.
Revenue in 1Q20, when compared with 1Q19, increased:
- + 4.3% at Vodafone;
- -11.4% at Telecom Itália, being -11.1% at Italy and -12.4% in Brazil (in Euros)
Other Highlights
- Aliança Conecta Brasil F4, an entity focused on the development of broadband in Brazil, held an online event with the participation of Leonardo Moraes (Anatel), Rodrigo Abreu (Oi), Sun Baocheng (Huawei) and its president Daniel Vilela;
- The Brazilian consumer paid R$ 65 billion in taxes on telecom in 2019 (SindiTelebrasil);
- Ecommerce in Brazil grew 47% in April, compared to March, according to a survey by ABComm in partnership with Konduto. The average ticket, which was R$ 417 in 2019, rose to R$ 492;
- TIM activated its fiber access network (FTTH) in the cities of Contagem and Betim;
- Sun Baocheng is the new CEO of Huawei Brazil, replacing Yao Wei, who has held the position since 2016.
Coming Soon
- IoT 2020 BRASIL SUMMIT on June 3rd
- Oi's 1Q20 results on May 28th
Competitive Operators
Competitive operators are the fixed broadband providers that have a market share in Brazil smaller than 5%. These include:
- Algar and TIM, that still have a great number of xDSL accesses;
- Brisanet, Sumicity, Acon, Unifique and Vero that have the majority of their accesses on fiber;
- SKY has a 4G network, but is losing subscribers;
- Hugues offers fixed broadband via satellite and is increasing.
Note: This ranking differs from that published by Anatel, as it considers groups formed by more than one provider.
Oi
- Oi ended March with R$ 5.6 billion in cash, R$ 327 million less than in February. The operator invested R$ 2.1 billion in 1Q20. (Judicial Recovery Report);
- S&P revised the operator's credit rating from "B" to "B-" globally and from "brA-" to "brBBB" on a national scale. In the same vein, the agency reduced Oi's projected revenue for 2020 and 2021 to R$ 19.3 billion, compared to R$ 21.5 billion and R$ 22.0 billion previously forecast;
- Anatel concluded that there is an imbalance in the concession contracts in the amount of R$ 3.3 billion in favor of the government, resulting from goal balances in the Universalization Plans. Of this total, R$ 2.8 billion refers to Oi;
- Oi's ON shares fell 13.0% in the week and PN shares by 7.4%.
MVNO
- MVNOs presented net adds of 117 thousand mobile accesses in 1Q20 reaching 1.3 million mobile accesses. The main companies are Arquia (Datora) counting 566 thousand mobile accesses, Safra (355 thousand), Surf Telecom (361 thousand) and America Net (32 thousand);
- Intercel, owned by Banco Inter, is the newest MVNO in Brazil. It had Surf Telecom as enabler.
5G
- This week Teleco publishes SindiTelebrasil's contribution to the public consultation for the 5G frequency auction of the main Telecom entities in the section “In Debate”.
Other highlights
- Brazil ended 1Q20 with 25.8 million M2M terminals, of which 1.9 million are credit card machines and 9.9 million IoT terminals. Net additions in the quarter were 773 thousand and 370 thousand respectively;
- Vivo's FTTH network started to cover other four cities of the state of São Paulo: Birigui, Mairinque, Poá and Ferraz de Vasconcelos;
- Unifique acquired three SCM providers: Infoway, Snet and Station;
- Hispamar announced that it will start the deployment of its satellite-based community WiFi service in locations in Maranhão. The service will be provided in partnership with EasyTV.
- 21% of Brazilian city halls have an operations center for monitoring situations such as traffic, security or emergency (TIC GOVERNO ELETRÔNICO 2019);
- Intelsat formalized its request for judicial reorganization. The company's estimated debt is US$ 14.5 billion;
- US pay-TV providers lost 2.1 million subscribers in 1Q20, double of what they had lost in 1Q19. (Leichtman)
Coming Soon
- Enrich CALA episode 1: Media and Entertainment (May, 21st)
- IoT 2020 BRASIL SUMMIT (June, 3rd)
Fixed Broadband in1Q20
- Competitive providers closed March counting 11,4 million fixed broadband accesses and net adds of 110 thousand accesses in the month. Providers that reported a total of 485 thousand accesses in February didn't do it in March;
- Vivo and Oi continued to present negative net adds of fixed broadband accesses in the month. The gains with fiber accesses are not yet offsetting the losses in xDSL accesses;
- Vivo lost 343 thousand xDSL accesses in 1Q20 and gained 176 thousand fiber accesses;
- Oi lost 452 thousand xDSL accesses in 1Q20 and gained 247 thousand fiber accesses.
Vivo in 1Q20
Comparing 1Q20 with 1Q19, Vivo's net revenue increased:
- -1.4% in the total, being -0.1% in the mobile and -3.6% in fixed;
- +0.1% in mobile services;
- -2.9% in handsets sale;
- +13.8% in corporative data and CIT;
- +6.6% in fixed broadband;
- -10.3% in Pay TV;
- -18.8% in voice (fixed telephony) and others
Vivo's FTTH network covered 22 news cities in 1Q20, reaching 11.7 million residences (Home passed – HPs), being 22.7% of them connected through accesses (Take-up rate).
Vivo's recurring EBITDA margin reached 40.9% in 1Q20.
A depreciação do real brasileiro em relação ao euro afetou negativamente os resultados reportados pelo Grupo Telefônica, que apresentou queda de 5,1% na receita do 1T20.
The depreciation of the Brazilian Real against the Euro negatively affected the results reported by the Telefônica Group, which presented a 5.1% drop in revenue in 1Q20.
TIM in 1Q20
Comparing 1Q20 with 1Q19, TIM's net revenue increased +0.6% in total, being:
- +0.1% in mobile segment, 1.2% in services and -2.9% in handsets;
- +6.4% in fixed segment, which represents 6% of the operator revenue.
Normalized EBITDA margin reached 45.7%.
1Q20 Results
Comparing 1Q20 with 1Q19, operators revenue increased:
- +3.2% at América Móvil
- +2.1% at France Telecom
- +2.1% at Millicom
- -0.9% at Comcast
- -1.6% at Verizon
- -2.4% at AT&T
- -3.8% at BT
- -5.1% at Telefônica
- -6.1% at Sprint
Disney's revenue jumped 21% in this comparison, affected by the Media Networks (cable and broadcasting) segment.
5G
- Anatel didn't convince that the filters will be sufficient to mitigate the interference of 5G in the parabolic TV receivers yet, that's what was stated by the president of Anatel in a Tele.Síntese's event;
- This week Teleco publishes Abrint's contribution to the public consultation about the 5G frequency announcement for the main entities in the sector in the section “Em Debate”;
- Tests carried out by OpenSignal in seven countries indicated that in only one of them (United States) the speed of 5G is lower than that of WiFi;
- 5G smartphone users continue to spend more time on 4G than 5G in these seven countries. In the USA they spend 12.7% of their time on 5G and in Korea 14.2%. Kuwait had the longest time in 5G (34.9%) and the United Kingdom the lowest (5.2%).
Oi
- News carried by the press indicate that TIM and Vivo would have started the due diligence process to evaluate the purchase of Oi Móvel;
- Oi's ON shares appreciated by 11.3% in the week and PN shares by 8.0%.
Other highlights
- The number of cell phone numbers ported in April (276 thousand) was 53% less than the number ported in March. In fixed telephony the fall reached 15%;
- Brazilian Supreme Court unanimously considered São Paulo State Law 10.995/2001, which established conditions for the installation of cell phone transmitting antennas, to be unconstitutional;
- Eight state governments and 13 city governments are using the mobility data provided by mobile operators;
- The production of the electric and electronic industry fell 9.1% in March, in relation to February. (Abinee);
- YouTube channel Jorge Dejorge was condemned by the São Paulo Court of Justice for teaching methods to pirate the pay TV signal;
- Defaults among SCM providers are affected more by corporate customers than residential (Abrint);
- Samsung led smartphone sales in the world in 1Q20 with 58.3 million, followed by Huawei (49 million), Apple (36.7 million) and Xiaomi (29.5 million). 275.8 million were sold in 1Q20, down 11.7% compared to 1Q19;
- US cable broadband operators MVNOs grew in 1Q20. Comcast's MVNO presented net adds of 216 thousand cell phones, Charter 290 thousand and Altice Mobile 41 thousand. Comcast's MVNO has 2.3 million cell phones and Charter's 1.4 million;
- Thirty-one technology companies launched the “Open RAN Policy Coalition” to promote policies for adopting open and interoperable solutions on the mobile radio access network (RAN);
- Mobile operator O2 (Telefonica) and the fixed broadband provider Virgin Media (Liberty) will merge in the UK, dramatically increasing competition for BT.
Coming Soon
- IoT 2020 BRASIL SUMMIT, June 3rd
