According to a report in El Caribe today, the telecommunications market has expanded its contribution to the Gross Domestic Product from 5% in September 2000 to 10.3% by the end of the third quarter of 2004. From 1987, the telecommunications market has experienced double-digit growth, with an average of 17.7%. Reporter Edwin Ruiz quotes Jose Alfredo Rizek, the new director of the Dominican Institute of Telecommunications, who said that the sector’s augmentation first boomed when Tricom was able to reach an interconnection agreement in 1994 with Verizon (then Codetel), which had previously enjoyed a monopoly of the local market since 1931. He said the second boom occurred with the arrival on market of Orange and Centennial.
Rizek told El Caribe that the fastest growing segment of the market is for users of pre-paid telephone cards.
Statistics now show that as of 30 September, there were 2.5 million cell phones in use, meaning that 28 of every 100 Dominicans have a cell phone, up from 1.1% in 1996. Internet accounts have increased during the same period, from 5,819 to 104,239 accounts, and an estimated eight people using each connection, according to Indotel. Some 21,286 Dominican households had access to broadband DSL service.
Manuel E Bonilla of Verizon estimates that by 2007, companies will be seeing revenues of RD$1.9 billion ? four times more than in 1993. Of the total, RD$400 million will stem from mobile phone calls. Bonilla says that Verizon controls 44% of the market, followed by Orange and its 26% market share, Tricom with 22% and Centennial with 8%. He said the companies have invested US$1.5 billion in the sector from 2001 to 2004, but while they employed 3,295 people in 2000, employment is now down to 1,860.
Rizek says that telephone rates should go down in December by 10%-20%, in order to reflect the appreciation of the DR peso.