Despite a recent negative antitrust ruling, Vivo, the Brazilian unit of Spanish Telefónica, views 2013 as a good year. The carrier focused on increasing its postpaid base and encouraging data usage (the MultiVivo offering is one example). In Brazil’s LTE space, Vivo has the largest presence, having launched commercial services in 73 municipalities—Vivo offers 3G in 3,131 cities and has connected 1.7 million homes with optical fiber. During a press conference, Telefónica Brazil’s CEO, Antonio Carlos Valente, reiterated the company’s commitment to expanding LTE coverage and growing its postpaid base, especially for data usage, as well as expanding its fiber network (the corporate segment and IPTV are targets).
Valente avoided giving much information about last week’s decision by the antitrust regulator Cade, telling Telefónica to leave TIM or find a new Vivo partner. “There’s nothing much to evaluate at this moment,” Valente said. The CEO mentioned Telefónica’s entry into the Telco holding company, which controls TIM, back in 2007, reinforcing that the Spanish group has been conducting regular operations in compliance with the law. “During this period, both companies have worked properly, competing in all markets. Therefore, we have built a reputation showing that we respect the rules,” Valente said.
Nextel job cut: NII Holdings, which operates under the Nextel brand in Latin America, announced a plan that includes reduction of more than 25% of the staff at the company’s headquarters and the elimination of more than 1,400 positions in its market operations. NII Holdings expects to incur cash costs related to employee severance in the range of $25 million to $35 million. In addition, Nextel closed on the sale of 1,483 communications sites in Mexico and 1,940 sites in Brazil to the American Tower Corporation.
AMX in Mexico: Mexico’s telecom regulator has begun proceedings to determine whether América Móvil is a dominant company in the telecom market. The carrier received a notice from the Federal Telecommunications Institute (Instituto Federal de Telecomunicaciones, or “IFT”), regarding the initiation of a proceeding for the determination of preponderant economic actor in Mexico’s telecommunications market and possible imposition of regulatory measures.
LTE in Latin America: Informa Telecoms and Media released a review of the LTE landscape in Latin America. The consultant firm estimates that as of 3Q13, there were 820,000 LTE subscriptions in the region. After tracking LTE deployments across 10 countries and 161 price plans, Informa found that the average price for a smartphone LTE plan was $67 (taxes included), and for a modem or tablet LTE plan, it was $37.
The study concluded that operators have opted to be conservative in the design of their LTE plans, segmenting only per type of device and offering volume-based plans. Informa noted there is a risk to this approach since pricing plans can be easily compared across different operators, which in turn, can lead to a price war once the competition gets tougher in the 4G market.
More news from the Latin American region:
- Venezuela’s Conatel launched an LTE auction in the AWS, 2600MHz bands. The tender is for two paired 2×10MHz blocks of frequencies in the 1710MHz-2170MHz (AWS) band and four paired spectrum blocks in the 2500MHz-2690MHz band (two 2×10MHz and two 2×20MHz).
- By the end of 2013, Latin American cellular subscriptions are expected to grow by 3.9% to reach 709.4 million. An expanding population base and positive economic indicators for a number of Latin American markets means the region continues to attract the interest of foreign and regional telcos and investors.
- Antel, Uruguay’s state owned telecom, is bringing mobile communications to the country’s Antarctic base with Ericsson technology.
- GlobeNet, an international wholesale provider of submarine capacity, announced it has completed construction on the new extension of its subsea network to Colombia. The anchor tenant on this new express route from its landing on Colombia’s Atlantic coast to Miami, Florida is UNE EPM Telecomunicaciones.
- Viva-Trilogy Dominicana S.A., a Dominican Republic mobile network, has announced the completion of a backup power pilot program using GE technology. According to the company’s statement, the pilot project resulted in an 88% reduction in backup power costs and diesel fuel expenses as well as a 60% decrease in site energy costs.
