The Transformation in Latin America

As Frost & Sullivan’s telecom industry manager for Latin America, Buenos Aires-based Ignacio Perrone has a unique region-wide view of the business. He’s helping to pull together the VON Latin America Summit 2009, and he spoke by phone recently with VON editor Richard Martin to discuss trends and developments in advanced IP services across Latin America.

VON: Can you talk about the major trends in telecom happening right now in Latin America?

Frost & Sullivan analyst Ignacio Perrone

Ignacio Perrone: It has to be mobile and wirelees, and broadband connectivity. In major markets like Mexico and Brazil, these are expanding tremendously. The interesting thing is we still have some good room to grow in terms of penetration; in the more developed countries like Argentina and Chile, which are more advanced in terms of mobile penetration, which is already at 100 percent, even there, there is room for growth. In the major markets, like Mexico and Brazil, they are still below 100 percent. So the industry in general is transforming itself, with a broad shift in revenue sources toward mobile and broadband.

VON: The region has enjoyed relatively strong overall economic growth, until the worldwide downturn hit last fall. Is the growth in the mobile and broadband businesses tracking with GDP growth, or outpacing it?

IP: It’s definitely outpacing GDP growth, and that has been the case for last few years. Even in 2009, a bad year for most countries in the region, we’re still forecasting growth in mobile and broadband, while the general consensus points to small decreases in economic output.

VON: What’s driving that growth?

IP: That’s a tough question. I’d say that new technologies are finding really fertile ground, and becoming pervasive. Most all industries, as well as the government and consumers, find reasons to be buying new devices and adopting these new technologies. Either they are playing a role in enhancing productivity, or they’re becoming new sources of entertainment and social interaction.

VON: Can you compare those trends to the U.S.? How is Latin America different?

IP: The patterns are more or less the same, although we of course usually see new product launches after some delay, after the U.S. and other advanced markets like Western Europe. But that gap has been closing, particularly for things that use the Internet as their medium: With social networks, for example, you don’t need a very complex operation to be gaining Facebook users in Chile, or Argentina. It’s the same platform. Users can come from anywhere in the world. So the gap is closing slowly.