INTERVIEW – Romania’s Telecoms Market To Grow in 2008-2009 Despite Global Crisis

“In our opinion, the international financial crisis will not hold back the rise of the Romanian telecommunications market, “Liviu Nistoran told SeeNews in a recent written interview. Nistoran was appointed as ANC head in August.

“ANC will keep monitoring the progress of this sector of the Romanian economy and will intervene, as it has been doing so far every time when market studies indicate a need for competition deficiencies to be remedied,” Nistoran said.

Nistoran expects that Romania's telecommunications market will grow by 10% this year to almost five billion euro ($6.4 billion). In 2007, the market grew by 16.7% to 4.61 billion euro.

“In 2009 it will reach, according to our estimates, a value of some six billion euro, including hardware equipment and software services,” Nistoran said. Internet services are expected to be the main growth driver, he added.

The Romanian personal computer (PC) market rose by 23.3% year-on-year in terms of value in the second quarter of 2008, while shipments increased by 29.3% on the year in the same period, IT research company International Data Corporation (IDC) said in October.

IDC expects this growth rate to hold in the coming quarters driven by the introduction of new brands, public investment in the state administration and education sectors, and organic growth of small and medium-sized businesses.

There are some 2,000 licensed telecommunication and postal services providers in Romania, ANC data showed. The top 20 providers of telecommunication services had a combined turnover of 4.27 billion euro in 2007, up by 18.1% from the previous year.

Five wireless operators compete in the country of 21.5 million people: the local units of France's Orange, global telecoms giant Vodafone and Greek Cosmote; Romanian telecommunications group RCS&RDS, and Zapp Mobile, operated by Romania-based Telemobil. The top three mobile operators all have reported increasing revenue as of end-September.

In September, ANC awarded the country’s leading fixed-line operator RomTelecom a licence to operate as the sixth mobile operator.

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