UK Home and Small Business Broadband ISP Lines Hit 23.7M in 2014

Ofcom’s latest Telecoms Market Data Tables update has revealed that the United Kingdom ended 2014 with a total of 23.73 million fixed line residential and small business broadband ISP connections (excluding corporate lines), which is up by +319k in Q4 2014 and marks a good quarter of growth from the +192k added in Q3 2014.

Furthermore it’s also noted that, after a brief blip in Q3 2014, the market share of BT’s related consumer / retail division has returned to growth, increasing from 31.9% in Q3 2014 to 32% in the final quarter.

Meanwhile the decline in old style pure copper ADSL broadband lines has slowed, while cable (Virgin Media) connections have continued their steady rise (we expect this to improve as Virgin boost their UK coverage to 60% over the next few years) and “fibre broadband” (FTTC, FTTP, FTTB etc.) continued to add new connections faster than any of the other listed connectivity types.

The quarterly update also reveals that the total number of fixed phone lines (PSTN and ISDN channels) has improved slightly to 33.2 million, although this is still down by just 0.2% on the end of 2013.

A quick look above shows that residential lines are still growing, while business lines are where all the declines appear to originate and both tend to cancel each other out. It’s also noted that total fixed telephony revenues were £2.03bn in Q4 2014, which is £6m (0.3%) up on the previous quarter and -£56m (-2.7%) lower than Q3 2013.

Meanwhile, on the mobile telecoms front, the UK became home to 83.7 million mobile subscriptions at the end of Q4 2014, which is +994,000 more (1.2%) than a year previously. Related services generated £3.85 billion in retail revenues in Q4 2014, a £9 million (0.2%) increase compared to Q4 2013.