A new report revealed Dutch telecoms operators increased revenue from multi-play subscriptions by 7.4 per cent year on year to €933 million ($1 billion) in the third quarter of 2015 as interest in plans that combine three or more telecoms services continues to grow.
The Dutch Consumer Multiplay Market 2015 Q3 report from Telecompaper noted that the number of households with quad-play subscriptions -- which typically combine fixed broadband, voice and TV packages with mobile plans -- reached more than 600,000 at the end of the quarter.
Indeed, almost 9 per cent of all broadband subscriptions were part of quad-play plans at the end of the third quarter, up from 5.5 per cent a year earlier. The report further noted that quad-play revenue increased to almost 14 per cent of all multiplay revenues in the market, from slightly more than 8 per cent a year ago.
Despite the growth in quad-play, the majority of households are still on triple-play subscriptions. Almost 4 million households in the Netherlands combine three services (fixed or mobile) at one provider. Telecompaper said cable operator Ziggo accounts for almost 61 per cent of all triple-play subscribers, and KPN has around 29 per cent. The remaining 10 per cent is divided among Caiw, M7, Tele2 Netherlands, Delta and Vodafone Netherlands.
Until recently KPN was the only Dutch telecoms operator to offer quad-play plans with KPN Compleet. Vodafone NL launched its own quad-play plan this year with Powered Up, and has been offering triple-play plans since 2014.
However, Vodafone NL said last week that it was suing KPN over alleged anti-competitive behaviour that it said delayed its ability to compete effectively during an important period for the Dutch multi-play market.
Vodafone NL estimates the total damages to its business at €115 million because it was prevented from gaining a significant market share "in a crucial period when more than 100,000 households per quarter chose to move to 'all-in-one' propositions."
In our recent special report on quad-play markets, the Netherlands was ranked fifth among five leading markets in Europe based on household penetration of quad-play bundles. The top four markets were France, Portugal, Belgium, Spain.
For more:
- see this Telecompaper release
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