09 January 2019 - In the last three years, operators invested around 250 million EUR in electronic communications, said CEO of the Agency for Electronic Communications and Postal Services, Darko Grgurović.
He thinks that the trend of the positive development of this sector was continued, both in the context of infrastructure and provision of services.
“Investment volume in the last couple of years was higher than the third of total revenues of this sector. For comparison, in the EU states, investments at an annual level range from 12-15% of the revenue in the electronic communications sector,” says Grgurović.
He said that 117 million EUR was invested in 2016, that is, 50,8% of the total revenue of the sector. In 2017, there was around 82 million EUR of investments. Last year 44,8 million EUR were invested, and around 33,7 million EUR are planned for this year. Considering that the greatest operators at the Montenegrin market operate within the world-famous and regional telecommunication groups, it can be stated that they are stable and that a predictable regulatory framework that guarantees further development of the market has been established.
“Montenegro is recognized as a state with favourable business environment, that is improving with years. With NATO accession and with continuous progress in the European integration, Montenegro became even more attractive for the investors in all fields,” said Grgurović.
Huge investments in the sector of electronic communications led to increasing int he number of connections, quality and reduction in service prices.
“Increase in the number of connections caused penetration of the broadband Internet access by 73,4% concerning the number of households. Judging by this indicator, Montenegro came closer to the EU states regarding penetration average which amounted 75% at the end of 2017,” said Grgurović.
By degree of mobile networks signal coverage, Montenegro can be compared to the most developed states of Europe. All the three operators provide 99% of GSM coverage. All these indicators point out the continuous development of technologies and the accessibility of the most contemporary services.
Montenegrin Electronic Communication Operators have invested in the Montenegrin market more than 500 million EUR in the past ten years. Also, the Agency built five facilities for the control and monitoring of radio-frequency spectre, main measurement and control centre, regional measurement and control centre and three remote measurement and control stations in Pljevlja, Rožaje and Kotor.
