News
19.11.2024

How the Ukrainian Fixed Internet Access Services Market Changed in 2024: BRDO Analytical Dashboard

The Better Regulation Delivery Office (BRDO) has launched an analytical dashboard – “The Fixed Internet Access Services Market.” It is the only public interactive tool in the country that aggregates information about the key characteristics of the fixed communication services market over the past three years. The dashboard enables tracking of the main trends and dynamics of the fixed Internet access market of Ukraine. Open data from the NCEC regulator and information about single taxpayers were used to prepare the dashboard.

According to the BRDO analytical dashboard, the Ukrainian fixed Internet access services market in 2024 demonstrates the following indicators:

  • Around 8.5 million Ukrainian subscribers—households, businesses, and institutions—use fixed Internet access services, with 27% located in rural areas. Since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion, the number of subscribers significantly decreased but has now recovered to the 2021 level.
  • Among the 4,100 fixed Internet providers, 63% are individual entrepreneurs. Their share of the market grows annually, and in 2024 they served 36.5% of subscribers (in rural areas – 45%). BRDO experts believe this growth is due to the readiness of microbusinesses to operate in commercially less attractive areas, particularly in rural areas, which are usually ignored by large operators.
  • The majority of service providers are individuals and legal entities under the simplified taxation system. However, they do not dominate the market: around 56% of revenue in the fixed Internet access sector in the first half of 2024 was generated by providers operating under the general taxation system.
  • As of the first half of 2024, 94% of fixed Internet access providers earned less than 5 million UAH in revenue.
  • The average revenue per user (ARPU) of legal-entity providers is higher than that of individual entrepreneurs (252 UAH/month vs. 227 UAH/month) and has been growing over the past three years. The average ARPU of the Top-10 companies in the market is 185 UAH/month.

“We are confident that the BRDO fixed Internet services dashboard will become an important tool for market participants and analysts. The tool was created using open data. Our goal is to enable the release of additional data from the NCEC regulator for a better analysis of the industry,” said  Ihor Samokhodskyi, Head of the IT and Telecom sector of the BRDO.

The Top-10 largest companies in the fixed Internet access services market in 2024 are JSC “Ukrtelecom”, PJSC “Kyivstar”, LLC “Volia-Cable”, PJSC “Datagroup”, LLC “NPK ‘Home-Net’”, LLC “Frinet”, LLC “Business and Technologies”, PJSC “Farlep-Invest”, PE “Dykyi Sad”, and LLC “LANET Network”. In the first half of 2024, the market leaders provided fixed Internet access to 33% of Ukrainian subscribers (2.8 million users), generating 28% of the industry’s revenue. At the same time, the market share of the largest operators, both in terms of revenue and subscriber numbers, decreases annually.

During September–October 2024, the State Tax Service (STS) started cancelling the simplified taxation system for fixed Internet access service providers that are small businesses. According to the latest NCEC data, 487 Internet providers have already filed applications to cease their operations. It is worth noting that providers under the simplified taxation system provided Internet access to 41% of all subscribers, including 51% in rural areas. BRDO experts believe that this decision by the STS will lead to a deterioration in service quality, decreased Internet access availability, increased vulnerability of networks to physical and cyberattacks, higher costs of Internet access, and other negative impacts.

The analytical dashboard for the fixed Internet access services market is available via the link on the BRDO website (in Ukrainian).

The analytical work on the study of the fixed Internet access market in Ukraine is made possible by the Digital Transformation Support Project with support from USAID and UK Dev. The implementing partner is the BRDO.