Telecommunications in Moldova

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Telecommunications in Moldova are maintained at a relatively high performance level. Because Moldova is a small country, telecommunications companies managed to achieve good coverage in both wired and wireless communications infrastructure. Landline is available in most settlements, however mobile phone popularity has vastly increased in recent years. Mobile communications infrastructures are fairly well developed but suffer from high prices, nonetheless the amount of mobile subscriptions is growing very fast compared to the landline. As far as the Internet is concerned, Moldova has one of the best wired Internet connections in the world as well as one of the cheapest in $ per Mbit.

Landline

After the break of the Soviet Union Moldova's telecommunications facilities were in a very poor condition. In 1990 Moldova had an average of 11 telephones per 100 inhabitants and there were more than 200,000 unfilled orders for telephone installations. The situation didn't progress much as only around 24,000 new lines were installed by 1994. Only after 1995 the state owned Moldtelecom began to upgrade their lines and stations. When in 1999 Moldtelecom became a JSC the company began a rapid upgrade process of all of their equipment and installations across the country. In 2000 around 440,000 new lines were installed and the overall power of telephone stations was increased to 645,000 numbers, at that time the average number of telephones per 100 inh. was around 16. The upgrade process to digital has also sped up and in 2008 around 83% of all stations were digital, for example in 1993 only 4% of all stations were digital. Currently all stations in the country are digital and the number of installed lines is 1,171,300 with around 33 telephones per 100 inh. In recent years however the general trend was the decrease in total number of landline subscriptions, after reaching its peak of 1,222,400 subscriptions in Q1 2014.
Currently Moldtelecom is the dominant provider in this industry holding around 89% of the market share, the rest are shared between some ISP's who provide triple play options to their customers, however most if not all of them rent lines from Moldtelecom.
Until recently an

closed dialing plan
on all of its territory.

Landline Subscriptions and Penetration level. (2020)[1]

  • Decrease Number of Landline Subscriptions - 1,027,689
  • Penetration Level - 38.9%

Market Structure by Number of Users. (2020)[1]

  • Moldtelecom - 89.5%
  • Other Providers - 10.5%

*Statistics do not include data from Transnistria.

Mobile telephony

Moldtelecom headquarters, Chișinău

The mobile telephone market of Moldova is divided between two

TeliaSonera entered the market with its own network under the brand of Moldcell and thus became the second carrier in the country. Moldtelecom became the third carrier when it launched its own network in March 2007 under the brand of Unité. In December 2007 another carrier named Eventis
entered the market but three previous carriers have already saturated it so much that on February 5, 2010 Eventis declared bankruptcy and shut down its network.
After the
War of Transnistria in early 1990s Transnistrian
government denied access of operation for many Moldavian based companies on its territory including telecommunications companies. As such the only major carrier on its territory is Interdnestrcom or IDC who began its operation in 1998.
Unlike Internet market the state of the mobile market in the country is very poor, while coverage is not really an issue all carriers practice archaic methods that carriers in many developed countries have long since abolished, general prices are very high compared to other CIS and even EU countries with no change in this segment in many years in fact in some cases the prices have even increased, mobile Internet access is in no better condition with very high prices and very low monthly caps compared to extremely well developed and cheap wired Internet access.
The first millionth subscription was registered in September 2005 since then the number of subscriptions has quadrupled and now amounts to around 4,323,500 which is almost 25% more than the estimated population of the country (without Transnistria), this means that the penetration level has exceeded 100%.
In October 2008 Moldcell became the first carrier in Moldova to launch a 3G network, currently, all carriers provide 3G services throughout the country. In September 2009 Moldova became the first country in the world to launch high-definition voice services (HD voice) for mobile phones, and the first country in Europe to launch 14.4 Mbit/s mobile broadband at a national scale, with over 40% population coverage. On April 26, 2012, Interdnestrcom becomes the first carrier in the country to launch a commercial LTE network. On November 20, 2012, Orange became the second carrier in the country and first in official Moldova to successfully launch commercial LTE network. On December 24, 2012, Moldcell became the third carrier in the country to successfully launch a commercial LTE network. On October 22, 2015, Unité became the last carrier to launch a commercial LTE network.[2]

Mobile Subscriptions and Penetration level. (2020)[1]

  • Decrease Total Number of Mobile Subscriptions - 4,108,207
  • Decrease Number of Active Mobile Subscriptions - 3,420,383
  • Penetration Level of Active Users - 129.5%

Market Structure by Number of Users. (2020)[1]

*Statistics do not include data from Transnistria.

Internet

Main article: Internet in Moldova

Chişinău
.
Moldtelecom is the only ISP that offers its services throughout the country on a wide scale, StarNet follows offering its services in several large towns and regional centers. Other ISP's are limited to their town or region.
Since 2008 all mobile carriers offer
HSDPA
Internet access throughout the country. LTE is also available in Chişinău and select regions and is provided by all carriers. While Moldtelecom and StarNet are major players on the "wired Internet access" market, Orange Moldova, Moldcell and Unité are major players on "mobile Internet access" market. However, because the general state of the mobile market in the country is rather poor the gap between prices and quality for wired and mobile Internet is extremely high.
After the
War of Transnistria in early 1990s Transnistrian
government denied access of operation for many Moldavian based companies on its territory including telecommunications companies. As such the only major ISP's in that area are local IDC or Interdnestrcom (Интерднестрком) and LinkService, both operate only on Transnistrian territory.
The most popular wired Internet access technology is
xDSL comes second with about 19% of the market share. Average download speed throughout the country is estimated to be around 120 Mbit/s according to Ookla Net Metrics.[6]
In Chişinău and some regional centers speeds as high as 1 Gbit/s are easily available through FTTx.

Number of Broadband Subscriptions. (2020)

  • Wired:[1]
    • Increase Number of Wired Subscriptions - 719,001
    • Penetration level - 27.2%
  • Mobile:[1]
    • Decrease Number of Mobile Subscriptions - 2,371,108
    • Penetration level - 89.8%

Structure of Wired Broadband Service Market, by Access Technology. (2020)[1]

  • Increase FTTx - 72.3%
  • Decrease xDSL - 19.2%
  • Increase Cable - 8.2%
  • Decrease Other - 0.3%

Top Level Domain: MD

*Statistics do not include data from Transnistria.


Internet hosting service

Moldova has numerous internet hosting services:

Television

Main article: Television in Moldova

television tower
in Chişinău which took a little over a year to complete, the finished tower was 196 meters tall and could broadcast within a 60 km radius. The first television transmission was sent on 30 April 1958 at 19:00 and included amongst other things cheers from all the parties that participated in the project's development as well as some local celebrities.

At first programs were broadcast only two times a week on Friday and Sunday but by the end of 1958 broadcasts became daily. The first live broadcast in the country also happened in 1958.

In 1961 the coverage area was expanded after several relay masts were constructed in

IPTV services in Chişinău and other towns offering multiple channels in both SD and HD qualities.[10][11] Local broadcasting has remained fairly undeveloped since the time it was first launched although progress towards better quality is quite rapid with most local channels hoping to go fully digital in the near future.[12]

Subscriptions and Penetration level. (2020)[1]

  • Increase Number of multichannel TV subscriptions - 360,932
  • Household Penetration level - 41.0%

Structure of multichannel TV subscriptions, by reception technology. (2020)[1]

  • Increase IPTV - 58.4%
  • Decrease Cable - 41.6%

of which:

  • Increase Digital - 78.9%
  • Decrease Analog - 21.1%

*Statistics do not include data from Transnistria.

Printed media

Main article: List of newspapers in Moldova

The main daily newspaper in the republic, Moldova Suverană, is published by the government. Sfatul Țării is published by Parliament, which also publishes the daily Nezavisimaya Moldova in Russian. Other principal newspapers include Rabochiy Tiraspol' (in Russian, the main newspaper of the Slavs in Transnistria), Ţara, Tineretul Moldovei/Molodezh Moldovy (in Romanian and Russian), and Viaţa satului (published by the government).

The main cultural publication in Moldova is the weekly journal

Basarabia (also published by the Writers' Union), Chipăruş, Alunelul, Femeia Moldovei, Lanterna Magică, Moldova, Noi, and SudEst
.

Basa Press
, an independent news service, was established in November 1992.

General Information

  • Fixed telephony subscriptions - 1,143,900 (2017)[13]
  • Fixed telephony penetration - 32.2% (2017)[13]
  • Mobile telephony subscriptions - 4,460,000 (2017)[14]
  • Mobile telephony penetration - 125.6% (2017)[14]
  • Wired Broadband subscriptions - 584,300 (2017)[15]
  • Wired Broadband penetration - 16.5% (2017)[16]
  • Mobile Broadband subscriptions - 2,430,078 (2017)[17]
  • Mobile Broadband penetration - 68,4% (2017)[17]
  • Internet hosts - 711,564 (2012)[18]
  • Internet Service Providers (ISP's) - 80 (2015)[4]
  • Country code (Top level domain) - MD

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i "EVOLUŢIA PIEŢEI DE COMUNICAŢII ELECTRONICE în anul 2020; ANRCETI" (PDF). Anrceti.md. Retrieved 11 September 2021.
  2. ^ "Noutati curente - Unite este partenerul programului DOR". Archived from the original on 2016-03-06.
  3. ^ "Global Value Index | Net Index from Ookla". Net Index. Archived from the original on 2013-06-02. Retrieved 2014-07-13.
  4. ^ a b "La finele anului 2015, Volumul total al vânzărilor pe piața serviciilor de acces la Internet fix a depășit cifra de un miliard de lei. | ANRCETI". Anrceti.md. 2016-03-10. Retrieved 2016-03-10.
  5. ^ "Evoluţia pieţei: Internet fix şi transmisiuni de date | ANRCETI". Anrceti.md. Retrieved 2016-03-10.
  6. ^ "Moldova's Mobile and Fixed Broadband Internet Speeds". Net Index. Retrieved 2021-09-15.
  7. ^ "Istoric | Stiri Moldova, video, stiri, stiri online | IPNA "Teleradio-Moldova"". Trm.md. Retrieved 2014-07-13.
  8. ^ "Tot mai mulți abonați dau preferință serviciului de televiziune contra plată în format digital | ANRCETI". Anrceti.md. Retrieved 2016-03-15.
  9. ^ "Zebra Tv". Zebra.md. Retrieved 2014-07-13.
  10. ^ "StarNet". Starnet.md. Retrieved 2014-07-13.
  11. ^ "Televiziune digitală | Moldtelecom". Moldtelecom.md. Retrieved 2014-07-13.
  12. ^ [1] Archived September 22, 2013, at the Wayback Machine
  13. ^ a b "Evoluţia pieţei: sectorul telefonie fixă | ANRCETI". Anrceti.md. Retrieved 2016-03-03.
  14. ^ a b "Evoluţia pieţei: sectorul telefonie mobilă | ANRCETI". Anrceti.md. 2016-03-01. Retrieved 2016-03-01.
  15. ^ "Evoluţia pieţei: Internet fix şi transmisiuni de date | ANRCETI". Anrceti.md. Retrieved 2016-03-10.
  16. ^ "Evoluţia pieţei: Internet fix şi transmisiuni de date | ANRCETI". Anrceti.md. Retrieved 2016-03-10.
  17. ^ a b "Evoluţia pieţei: Internet mobil dedicat | ANRCETI". Anrceti.md. Retrieved 2016-03-10.
  18. ^ "The World Factbook". Cia.gov. Retrieved 2014-07-13.

External links

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