Is "Fair Share" Really Necessary?

Ignoring for a moment the arguments about network interconnection principles and existing policies that have internet domains compensating each other for unequal traffic flows, do telcos really “need” so-called “fair share” payments by a few hyperscale app providers?

Nobody likely disputes the challenge of monetizing continual investments in capacity, on either mobile or fixed networks. In competitive markets, payback is a challenge. But even so, the industry’s own data suggests there is not an urgent business model problem. 

Industry sources might argue that profit margins and revenue growth rates are lower for mobile and fixed network telcos than in the average of all other industries.

According to GSMA Intelligence, the average net profit margin for telcos globally was 14.1 percent in 2022, lower than the average net profit margin for all industries, which was 16.9 percent. Likewise, GSMA Intelligence says the average revenue growth rate for telcos globally was 2.2 percent in 2022, lower than the average revenue growth rate for all industries, which was 4.2 percent.

Critics might simply point out that the telecom service provider business always was a slow-growth, utility-like industry. So low growth rates are not new, nor a surprise. Lower profit margins than “average” also are not a surprise. Each industry has a different growth rate. 

And capital-intensive industries, whether generally considered utilities or not, generally have lower profit margins. 

Industry	Revenue Growth Rate (2022)	Capital Intensity
Telecommunications	2.2%	High
Electrical Power	3.4%	Very High
Natural Gas	3.8%	High
Wastewater	2.9%	Medium
Airlines	2.1%	High
Railroads	1.9%	Very High
Shipping	2.5%	Very High

So yes, connectivity service provider revenue growth rates are low.  But so are growth rates for other capital-intensive industries. Generally speaking, industries with less capital intensity also tend to grow faster. 

Industry	Revenue Growth Rate (2022)
Technology	6.5%
Healthcare	5.2%
Financial Services	4.8%
Consumer Discretionary	4.3%
Consumer Staples	3.9%
Industrials	3.6%
Energy	3.4%
Utilities	3.2%
Materials	3.0%
Real Estate	2.8%
Telecommunications	2.2%

Also, with the caveat that growth rates and profit margins can vary substantially between suppliers in different segments of the market, profit margins are not unusually low for service providers in any region. 

Slow revenue growth, as noted previously, has been--and remains--characteristic of telecom services, as is generally true for many other capital-intensive industries. 

Region	Telco Net Profit Margin	Revenue Growth Rate
North America	12.2%	1.8%
Europe	13.5%	1.9%
Asia	15.6%	2.5%
Latin America	12.8%	2.1%
Africa	9.3%	1.7%

How Disruptive is 5G Fixed Wireless?

Many observers have argued fixed wireless would not be a material driver of U.S. home broadband market share change. Just as vehemently, T-Mobile and Verizon have argued for precisely that impact. 

Cable operators say they have not seen material impact, yet. But at least some equity analysts now say fixed wireless will be highly disruptive. Wells Fargo telecom and media analysts Eric Luebchow and Steven Cahall predict fixed wireless access will grow from 7.1 million total subscribers at the end of 2021 to 17.6 million in 2027, growth that largely will come at the expense of cable operators. 

source: Polaris Market Research 

The impact on the installed base will occur more slowly, but the primary impact will be seen in net account additions. Accustomed to getting as much as 94 percent to 100 percent of net account growth, cable might see net new additions drop to perhaps 30 percent to 35 percent in 2023.

If 5G fixed wireless accounts and revenue grow as fast as some envision, $14 billion to $24 billion in fixed wireless home broadband revenue would be created in 2025. 

5G Fixed Wireless Forecast
	2019	2020	2021	2022	2023	2024	2025
Revenue $ M @99% growth rate	389	774	1540	3066	6100	12140	24158
Revenue $ M @ 16% growth rate	1.16	451	898	1787	3556	7077	14082
source: IP Carrier estimate

How important 5G fixed wireless might be depends on which estimates we use for total home broadband revenues, as well as the expected 5G fixed wireless growth rate.

By some estimates, U.S. home broadband generates $60 billion to more than $130 billion in annual revenues. The worse-case scenario for cable operators would be the higher growth rate and the lower revenue base. 

If the market is valued at $60 billion in 2021 and grows at four percent annually, then home broadband revenue could reach $73 billion by 2026. $24 billion would represent about 33 percent of total home broadband revenues. 

		2022	2023	2024	2025	2026
Home Broadband Revenue $B	60	62	65	67	70	73
Growth Rate 4%
Higher Revenue $B	110	114	119	124	129	134
source: IP Carrier estimate

If we use the higher revenue base and the lower growth rate, then 5G fixed wireless might represent about 10 percent of the installed base, which will seem more reasonable to many observers. 

Assuming $50 per month in revenue, with no price increases at all to 2026, 5G fixed wireless still would amount to about $10.6 billion in annual revenue by 2026 or so. That would have 5G fixed wireless representing about 14 percent of home broadband revenue, assuming a total 2026 market of $73 billion.

If the home broadband market were $134 billion in 2026, then 5G fixed wireless would represent about eight percent of home broadband revenue. 

Keep in mind that telcos and independent internet service providers also are expected to take share using fiber-to-home facilities as well. While Verizon expects most of its net additions to come from 5G fixed wireless, T-Mobile expects virtually all of its net additions to come from 5G fixed wireless. 

Mobile Bandwidth Growth Drops 60%, Wi-Fi Likely the Reason

Overall traffic growth for 14 large North American mobile service providers has slowed significantly from the rapid rate of increase seen in recent years, with operators reporting

as much as a 60 percent reduction in their rate of traffic growth.

Where traffic grew in triple digits in 2011, growth was in double digits in 2012, a PwC survey has found.

Many will speculate about the reasons for the slowdown. Some will suggest the growing number of lighter users, as more and more people start using smart phones. PwC analysts speculate that market maturation and late adopters who do not use as much data as early adopters could explain some of the slowing rate of data consumption.

Some of us think users simply are switching much of their device data consumption to Wi-Fi. In fact, Cisco estimates that, in 2016, as much as 70 percent of mobile data consumption will use Wi-Fi.

By 2017, almost 21 exabytes of mobile data traffic will be offloaded to the fixed network by means of Wi-Fi devices and femtocells each month, Cisco estimates. 4G Americas says Wi-Fi offload of mobile traffic is at 35 percent today in the United States and is estimated to be 68 percent by 2016.

Without Wi-Fi and femtocell offload, total mobile data traffic would grow at a compound annual growth rate of 74 percent between 2012 and 2017 (16-fold growth), instead of the projected 66 percent CAGR (13-fold growth), 4G Americas says.

Cisco notes that tthe global average for daily data consumption over Wi-Fi is four times that of cellular, averaging 55 MBytes per day for Wi-Fi, and 13 MBytes for cellular.

 Average Daily Wi-Fi and Mobile Data Consumption

Even as mobile device data consumption grows, consumers rationally respond to incentives, such as the ability to shift consumption to Wi-Fi in ways that protects their data caps. Ignoring such changes in consumer behavior has been an issue before.

In March 2011, for example, AT&T projected that data bandwidth growth would be on the order of eight to 10 times over then-current levels between the end of 2010 and the end of 2015.

That forecast appears to be based on an expectation that volumes would roughly double in 2011 and then increase by a further 65 percent in 2012.

Instead, AT&T seems to be seeing something like 40 percent annual growth. To be sure, 40 percent annual growth is significant. It means bandwidth consumption doubles about every two to three years.

Cisco estimates mobile broadband grew about 70 percent in 2012, and will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 66 percent from 2012 to 2017.

Some believe Wi-Fi offload will slow the rate of mobile broadband growth. On the other hand, even such offloading, at high rates of perhaps 80 percent, would slow the rate of growth by about 50 percent.

Is 11% North American Telecom Revenue Growth Possible?

Insight Research predicts that global telecommunications services revenue will grow from $2.1 trillion in 2012 to $2.7 trillion in 2017 at a combined average growth rate of 5.3 percent. For most people, that will seem reasonable, given the growth of wireless services globally.

Wireless subscriber growth, particularly in Asia and other emerging markets, will raise wireless revenues by 64 percent from current levels, while wireline revenues show only modest growth. And what growth occurs in the fixed network realm will happen in broadband services.

Wireless 3G and 4G broadband services are projected to grow at a compounded rate of 24 percent over the forecast period and wireline broadband services projected to grow at a 13 percent compounded rate over the same forecast horizon, the Insight Research predicts.  

The most-surprising prediction, by far, is the forecast that, between 2011 and 2016, North American carrier revenue will  rise from $287 billion to $662 billion, representing 11 percent compound annual revenue growth.


Granted, there is lots of activity in the U.S. and Canadian markets around mobile payments, mobile banking, advertising, commerce and machine-to-machine services. But not many think those initiatives will produce lots of revenue within the next five years. 


So if an 11-percent compound revenue growth rate were to occur, it would have to be driven by the basic services people already buy.
That rapid growth, on a compound basis, would lead to a doubling of industry revenue in five years. Unlike the global forecast, that will raise some eyebrows.

For starters, since U.S. firms represent about 90 percent of North American revenue, that forecast has to be based on U.S. revenue growth. And since just a few U.S. firms control about 80 percent of all revenue, that forecast also assumes a few firms, necessarily including AT&T and Verizon Wireless, will find huge new markets, fast.

That isn’t to discount what Sprint, T-Mobile USA, Comcast, Tme Warner Cable and others might be able to do. It’s just that a doubling of revenue in such a short time would require extraordinary growth, likely requiring an assumption that every North American customer will double the amount they are spending on communications services over the next five years.

That is not “impossible,” but would be extraordinarily rare. Consider that revenue growth in Europe, a similar market in many respects, might grow at far-lower rates of perhaps four percent annually.

Most rational observers would probably agree that North American growth rates of four percent a year for the next five years would be reasonable.

Likewise, global carrier revenue is expected to achieve a nine percent compound annual growth rate  from 2011 to 2016, growing to a total of $5.13 trillion, Insight Research says.

In terms of segment revenue, the latest forecast projects a 45 percent CAGR for global wireless broadband revenue, 14 percent for fixed-line broadband, about six percent growth for narrowband wireless services and negative three percent revenue change for fixed network narrowband services.

One way to look at the structure of the global market is to note that, by 2016, wireless broadband will account for about 28 percent of all communications service revenue. Narrowband wireless services will account for 38 percent of global revenue. Altogether, wireless will represent 66 percent of total industry revenue.

Fixed-line broadband will account for 11 percent of global revenue, while fixed-line narrowband services will represent 23 percent of total revenue. In aggregate, fixed line revenue will account for 34 percent of total service provider revenue, on a global basis.

For some of us, the big surprise is the aggressive forecast for North American growth.