Snapshot: Bolivia's telecommunications market in figures

Telecommunications revenues in Bolivia will decline again this year, according to projections by regulator ATT.

While between 2013 and 2017 the sector's revenues grew 3.4% a year on average, with a high of 13.5bn bolivianos (US$1.9bn) in 2017, since 2018 an average decline of 3.3% has been observed. For this year, revenues are expected to be 10.7bn bolivianos, according to ATT.

The watchdog estimates that mobile internet revenues will amount to 4.13bn bolivianos this year, while fixed internet services will bring in 2.38bn bolivianos and mobile voice services 1.49bn bolivianos.

The projected investment by operators for 2024 reaches US$448mn, almost 35% more than in 2023.

MOBILE TELEPHONY

At the end of the second quarter of this year, Bolivia had 12mn mobile lines, or 99 per 100 inhabitants. Of the total, 11.1mn corresponded to 3G and 4G lines.

Active mobile phone lines fell by 28,700 or 0.24% between December 2023 and June this year.

Prepaid customers accounted for 90.8% of all users and postpaid 9.2%, similar to end-2023.

ARPU of mobile voice services totaled 10.3 bolivianos in H1.

The Bolivian mobile market is split between Tigo, state-owned Entel and Viva.

FIXED INTERNET

Fixed internet connections totaled 1.42mn at end-June, 3.6% more than at the end of 2023. Between 2019 and June 2024, the number of fixed internet connections doubled.

Household penetration reached 57.4% by June 2024.

Of the connections, 93.4% were over fiber optics networks (FTTx), followed by cable modem with 2.71% and VDSL with 1.74%, among others.

Santa Cruz is the department with the most fixed internet accesses with 414,517 connections.

PAY TV AND LANDLINE TELEPHONY

Between December 2023 and June this year, 20,802 pay TV subscriptions were disconnected, representing a 3.65% reduction in the customer base. Service penetration was 22.3%.

Fixed telephone lines decreased 6.8% or by 28,666 compared to December 2023. At the end of June, fixed telephone lines reached 393,978, down from a high of 792,978 in 2015.