DSL Dominates Global Broadband

By Geoff Duncan December 14, 2006

New figures compiled for DSL Forum by market analysis firm Point Topic finds that DSL is by far the world’s most widely deployed broadband technology, with more than 173 million subscribers worldwide accounting for almost two thirds of the global broadband marketplace. And while the United States accounts for almost 24.5 million of those subscribers, China takes the number one slot with almost 35 million DSL subscribers. In the European Union, DSL accounts for for 82 percent of broadband access.

"As the global reach of broadband into people’s lives continues to grow, the range of access technologies used to deliver its benefits is also expanding to capitalize on the various available infrastructures," said Michael Brusca, president of the international DSL Forum. "Even though DSL is the predominant delivery technology in the world, the DSL Forum is working to extend the benefits of our own specifications to be equally applicable for other network technologies and to address the service delivery needs of the ever-growing range of multimedia devices and applications that depend on broadband for their success."

Point Topic found that cable broadband accounts for some 22.84 percent of broadband subscribers worldwide; Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH, or Fiber-pretty-darn-close-to-the-home, FTTx) accounted for 1.024 of global broadband subscribers, with satellite and other broadband technologies accounting for less than one and a half percent of all global broadband access. Owing to local franchise monopolies, cable broadband subscribers are account for a greater share of the broadband market in the U.S. than they do in the rest of the world.

Point Topic also found the United States remains the world’s largest broadband market, representing some 55.5 million subscribers; however, China is now running a close second at 48.5 million, and Japan is in third place with almost 26 million broadband subscribers.

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