The latest research from Gartner has estimated that there will be a total of 422 Million global households with a fixed broadband connection ( i.e. ADSL , Cable Modem , FTTH ) in the home by the end of 2009, up from 382m in 2008. This will increase to 580m by 2013.

It's estimated that 21 countries had fixed broadband connections in at least 50% of homes by the end of last year. In many countries, the rates are much higher; the highest penetration being in South Korea at 86% and the lowest being Indonesia at less than 1%. The UK penetration rate during 2008 stood at 63% and will hit 71% by 2013.


Mature markets such as those in Western Europe and USA will continue to see a slowing of broadband uptake as they near saturation, although emerging markets will compensate with rapid growth. China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand, Latin American countries, Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa will collectively provide twice as many new consumer broadband connections as mature markets (135m vs 62m).

Roughly 27m U.S. households will make up a large share of new broadband connections in mature markets between 2008 and 2013, with Japan accounting for almost 10 million, Germany with 5 million and the UK with slightly over 3 million connections.

Gartner estimates that the worldwide consumer fixed voice, Internet and broadband services market was worth $372bn (£234bn) in 2008 and that broadband access services supplied 27% of that total. Broadband will continue to be the growth engine in revenue, offsetting declining voice revenue and supplying almost 40% of the $347bn (£218.6bn) total in 2013.