Telefónica falls behind in Mexico's portability race

Spanish operator Telefónica did not fare well in Mexico's number portability war in the first quarter of this year.

The telco lost 1.6mn subscribers and earned 895,829 new ones, leading to a net loss of 706,493, according to sector regulator IFT.

Telecom specialist Jorge Fernando Negrete told local daily El Norte that Telefónica has not invested enough in infrastructure, compromising the quality of its service and thus its subscriber base.

Market leader Telcel registered a net gain of around 1mn subscribers, winning 2.55mn and losing 1.51mn in 1Q17.

A total of 1.26mn users decided to leave US telco AT&T, while 966,557 decided to join this company's subscriber base. With 10.5mn subscribers in 3Q16, AT&T will be able to survive the net loss of 298,253 users.

Regarding mobile virtual network operators (MVNO), which account for 1% of Mexico's mobile market, segment leader Virgin Mobile lost 54,592 subscribers and won 18,809 new ones.

QBOcel, a Mexican MVNO that recently hit the 200,000 subscriber mark, lost 236 users and gained 1,094 subscribers.