With eyes in Canada focussed on the Globalive story, it seems the OECD’s new broadband numbers slid under the radar screen.
On Friday, the OECD released figures for June 2009 penetration rates. Canada held onto its number 10 position in subscriptions per capita; Canada was precisely 360 subscriptions short of pulling ahead of Finland to move into the number 9 position.
Finland, the country that made headlines for its statement that broadband access is a right for all its citizens, lost two years worth of subscribers in six months to fall from number 6 to the number 9 position. It is no wonder their government had to make some kind of political statement like a universal broadband obligation, although it is possible that there has been some mobile substitution.
Despite the challenges of the economy, in the six months ended June 2009, the OECD says that more than half a million Canadians were added to wireline broadband services, while tens of thousands were knocked off Finland’s numbers. Canada’s broadband growth rate was the highest of all top 10 countries.
If you look at the OECD’s spreadsheets [such as here], you’ll see that most of the OECD broadband figures come from official government sources. Canada and the US are the only two countries that the OECD estimates broadband penetration from company quarterly financial reports.
How should the OECD source information from companies that do not report? These would include companies like SaskTel (that only reports annually) and privately held fixed wireless companies, cable companies and independent telcos.
There are also thousands of business accesses provided by multinationals carriers (such as AT&T;, Verizon, etc.) operating in Canada.
How would you produce reasonable estimates?