March the 23rd, 2023 - The Croatian communications market enjoyed revenues of 1.6 billion euros last year, representing an increase when compared to the year before.

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, the total revenues earned by the Croatian communications market back in 2022 amounted to a very impressive 1.6 billion euros, which is 3.6 percent more compared to what was recorded back in 2021. On top of that, the continued trend of investment growth in mobile and fixed communications networks continued, as was announced last week by the Croatian Regulatory Agency for Network Activities (HAKOM).

HAKOM stated that in the aforementioned period, revenues from broadband Internet access services increased by nine percent, from network and cable rental by five percent, and from paid television by four percent, while at the same time, revenues on the market for telephone services in the fixed network decreased by more than nine percent.

On the electronic Croatian communications market, last year's investments in very high capacity networks (VHCN) increased by six percent when compared to 2021, and the trend of investments in base stations (BTS) in mobile communications networks also continued.

In the fourth quarter of 2022, as HAKOM pointed out, the migration of users to fiber-optic technology continued, which affected the growth of such connections by 27.5 percent in a year. In the same period, total data traffic via fixed and mobile networks grew by 15.7 percent on average. The share of users of broadband connections with a speed higher than 100 Mbit/ also grew and amounts to 35.7 percent.

In the last quarter of 2022, foreign citizens spent more than 95 million roaming minutes of calls, which is an increase of 8.9 percent compared to the same period in 2021.

The number of SMS and MMS messages sent however was significantly lower compared to last year (a drop of 21.6 percent and 27.7 percent, respectively). In the last quarter of 2022, 62.3 percent of households used some form of paid television, and the trend of revenue growth from this service continued.

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ZAGREB, 13 April 2022 - The coverage with and access to the 5G network in Croatia has grown since the summer of 2021, when licenses for the 5G frequency range were issued, to 60-70%, and a new auction is being prepared for the existing frequencies, to be held in early 2023, HAKOM regulator official Tonko Obuljen said on Wednesday.

Obuljen, who chairs the HAKOM Council, was speaking at the third 5G Day event, organised by the Croatian Regulatory Authority for Network Industries (HAKOM), after a two-year break caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

"A lot has happened in the past two years. Frequencies were awarded, and a new auction is being prepared for the existing frequencies, for which licenses expire in 2024, and we want telecommunications companies to have time to prepare," Obuljen told Hina.

He noted that it was still difficult to assess how much money the new auction would bring to the state budget, adding that considering that most of the spectrum would be awarded at the national level, he expected all telecoms to participate.

HAKOM is glad about the development of the electronic communications market and 5G, which will certainly contribute to improving Croatia's position on Europe's digital map and with regard to the EU's DESI index on the degree of digitalisation, he said.

Obuljen noted that various startups developing solutions based on 5G technology would be presented at 5G Day, adding that some of the startups that had attended the first 5G Day  had developed their business and many were operating around the world.

One of them is Rimac Automobili, which today presented its visions and products, in which connectivity at high 5G speeds plays a major role.

"In five-six years we expect a boom in 5G services and solutions, which are applicable in all areas of life and work, notably transport, car industry, healthcare and medicine, energy and all other sectors," Obuljen said.

As for the situation on the market and expectations this year, Obuljen said that the market was constantly growing even though no longer in leaps because all telecoms offered convergent services and invested much, but that despite market saturation, growth was expected this year as well.

HAKOM director Miran Gosta said that prices on the telecommunications market would have to grow as well because of rising input costs, with telecoms being particularly concerned about electricity price increases. He added that it was difficult to say how much and when those prices would go up.

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ZAGREB, 16 March 2022 - A total of 13.5 million passengers were transported by rail in Croatia in 2021, which is 400,000 more than in 2020, as well as 15.3 million tonnes of goods, which is an increase of 200,000 tonnes, according to the Croatian Regulatory Authority for Network Industries (HAKOM).

The data indicates that railway passenger transport is slowly recovering from the crisis caused by the coronavirus pandemic, HAKOM said.

In the last quarter of 2021, slightly more than 4 million people used this mode of transport, up by 500,000 from the same period of 2020.

However, the number of railway passengers has still not reached the 2019 level when nearly 20 million people travelled by rail, of whom nearly 5.5 million did so in the last quarter of that year, which is nearly 1.5 million more than at the same time last year.

The Q4 2021 increase was partly due to the government decision on free rail transport for children and students, HAKOM noted.

In Q4 2021, 4.2 million tonnes of goods was transported by rail, which is about 100,000 tonnes more than in the same period of 2020 and about 310,000 tonnes more than in the last quarter of 2019.

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ZAGREB, 30 Jan 2002 - Access speed, prices, quality customer service and fast fault removal are most important to internet users in Croatia, while mobile network voice services and internet access are the communication services they use most, according to a survey by the HAKOM regulator.

The survey was conducted for HAKOM, the Croatian Regulatory Authority for Network Industries, in December by the Ipsos market research agency on 1,001 respondents aged 18 to 65.

98% of respondents use voice services in the mobile network, while the second most used service is internet access (82%).

In the fixed network, voice services are used by 65% of respondents, 76% use internet as part of a package of services, while 98% think their package provides all the services they need.

92% of respondents use a home Wi-Fi network to connect to the Internet, while 54% use a mobile network, with 97% doing so via smartphone, 87% via laptop and 45% via desktop.

About 50% of respondents said they would switch to an optical connection in the event of higher ADSL/VDSL prices, while almost one in three don't know their contracted speed.

For a majority of respondents with speeds below 100 Mbit/s, internet speed does not represent a restriction in internet use. 37% would like to have higher speeds but are not willing to pay for it, while 22% feel their speeds are higher than they need.

Respondents said they were not in the habit of checking their access speed, with most doing it only when they notice the speed has changed.

The survey shows that technical problems are almost as frequent as they were in 2020. The most frequent difficulties being no internet access, poor speed and Wi-Fi problems.

Respondents said they were mostly satisfied with current services and customer service, with 68% having changed operators a number of times due to lower prices.

Almost all internet users actively maintain online security by not downloading apps from unknown sources, protecting personal data and avoiding contact with unknown persons. However, 15% of respondents said they experienced cyber bullying.

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ZAGREB, 19 Sept , 2021 - The Croatian electronic communications market saw a 5% increase in total revenues in the first half of 2021 compared with the same period in 2020, while operators' investments rose by 4%, according to the data provided by the Croatian Regulatory Authority for Network Industries (HAKOM).

Revenues from broadband Internet access increased by 10%, from network rental by 7% and from pay television by 4%.

Investment in fiber optic infrastructure rose by 121%, and the number of connections using this technology went up by 32%. 

In the second quarter of the year the share of high-speed broadband connections of 30 Mbit/s and higher was 49% of the total number of connections. The number of broadband connections of 100 Mbit/s and higher is also increasing, reaching 22% in the total number of connections in the second quarter of 2021.

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June 21st, 2021 - HAKOM reports, in Q1 2021, a total of 4.3 million users spent 2.8 billion minutes on mobile networks in Croatia, which is a 6% increase year-on-year, and when it comes to the use of electronic communications, traffic across all broadband access technologies increased the most, by 54%, to 624.3 million gigabytes.

This is shown by market data from the Croatian Regulatory Authority for Network Industries (HAKOM).

"Internet traffic rose by 26.5% on the year. We talked much more on mobile phones, and total revenue in the electronic communications market went up by 3.3%," HAKOM said.

Continued decline in fixed and increase in mobile networks

According to HAKOM's data, fixed communications were the only segment in that market that didn't see an increase and continued to decline, with total revenue dropping by 4% compared with Q1 2020, to HRK 269.4 million, while the number of users decreased by 1.4%, to 1.2 million. They spent 404.2 million minutes in those networks, or 7% fewer.

Those networks also saw a drop in revenue from broadband Internet access services of 8.2%.

On the other hand, mobile networks registered an increase in total revenue of 2%, to HRK 889 million, while the number of users remained stable, 4.36 million.

However, due to the pandemic and less tourist traffic, phone calls made by Croatian users in international mobile networks saw a decrease of 14.2%. In comparison, phone calls made by foreign users in Croatian mobile networks saw a drop of 7.9%.

Mobile networks also increased revenue by 16%, or HRK 756.1 million, from broadband Internet access services compared with Q1 2020, while total revenue from those services went up by 5.4% in Q1 2021, to HRK 1.2 billion.

Market shares of mobile network operators remained similar to last year, with Hrvatski Telekom (HT) having the largest share of 46%, followed by A1 Hrvatska (35%) and Telemach Hrvatska (19.4%).

Total revenue in the electronic communications market increased by 3.3% from Q1 2020, with revenues increasing by 9.2% in the broadband Internet access market, by 3.5% in the television services market, and by 7.7% in the network and line rental services market, HAKOM said.

They stress that despite a slight decline in total investment in that market since the beginning of the year, investment in fiber access infrastructure saw a sharp rise of 140% on the year, which they consider important for maintaining the growth trend in the number of high-speed broadband connections.

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ZAGREB, 20 June, 2021 - The coronavirus pandemic has continued to adversely affect the Croatian postal services market, with the number of postal services provided in the first quarter of this year dropping to 70 million or by nearly 8% compared with the same period in 2020, the HAKOM regulator said.

HAKOM said that the volume of all postal services, except express parcels relating to online shopping, had declined in the first quarter, noting that, compared with the fourth quarter of 2020, the volume of express parcel delivery services had also fallen, by 3.1%.

The fall was mainly due to the distribution of printed matter, which declined by 20% compared with Q4 2020 and by 28% compared with Q1 2020.

The fall in the number of services provided also affected revenues, which dropped by 5% compared with Q4 and rose by 10% compared with Q1 2020. HAKOM said that the increase was due to a 23% rise in the delivery of express parcels relating to online shopping and an increase in prices of some of the so-called universal services.

The number of postal service providers on the Croatian market has remained the same. At the end of the first quarter of this year, these services were provided by 23 companies, among which Croatian Post (HP) remains the largest, with an 84.1% share in total turnover.

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ZAGREB, September 18, 2020 - About 67% fewer passengers travelled by rail in the second quarter due to the corona crisis compared to the same period last year while freight transport rose by 2.5% by taking over freight from other transport modes, the HAKOM regulatory agency informed on Friday.

Noting that a decrease in the number of passengers travelling by rail in Q2 was to have been expected because of the lockodown, the Croatian Regulatory Authority for Network Industries - HAKOM on Friday confirmed previous claims by Transport Minister Oleg Butkovic that as far as the cargo segment was concerned, the railway did not generate any loss.

A total of 3.66 million tonnes of goods were transported in Q2 according to HAKOM, which is 2.5% more year on year however it recorded a 'small' decrease (11,000 tonnes) compared to Q1 2020.

Similarly until now, the biggest freight transporter in Q2 was the national HZ Cargo with a share of 56.3% in train kilometres while the remainder of cargo was transported by eight other providers on the market.

Passenger travel reduced due to epidemic

Unlike freight transport, which continued to operate without any major disruptions during the entire time of the lockdown, passenger transport was significantly reduced in Q2 year on year, by almost 67%.

In numbers, that means that 1.7 million passengers travelled by train in Q2 this year compared to 5.1 million in 2019 Q2.

There were fewer passengers compared to Q1 too, when 4.7 million passengers travelled by train in that period.

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ZAGREB, September 13, 2020 - Internet traffic in Q2 2020 grew by close to 50% from the same period of 2019 yet the total income of the electronic communications market in H1 dropped by 5.4%, the Croatian Regulatory Authority for Network Industries (HAKOM) said this week.

The electronic communications market in Q2 was affected by the continuation of the COVID-19 pandemic, with primary and secondary schools as well as institutions of higher education having held online classes, just as many companies across the country introduced teleworking.

Considering the situation, data traffic and the number of mobile phone minutes grew as expected compared to the same period of 2019, with data traffic in April this year reaching record high consumption compared to all previous measuring, 191 PB, a 58% increase on April 2019.

Quarterly, data traffic grew by 46% from the same period of 2019, HAKOM said.

The total number of outgoing mobile network minutes also grew, by 18% from Q2 2019. At the same time, total mobile services revenue dropped by 17%.

In Q2, own users' roaming minutes dropped by 20% as did the duration of roaming phone calls by foreign nationals, by 52% from Q2 2019, also a result of the pandemic and travel ban.

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