Mobile Segment Drives French Telecommunications Market

The retail telecoms market in France grew in 2021 for the first time in ten years. Market regulator Arcep attributed the growth in part to a return to pre-pandemic form by the mobile sector.

Arcep’s new market update reveals that retail revenue increased 2.5% to €36.1 billion in 2021. Mobile service revenue, including M2M connections, rose 4.7% to €14.1 billion, while mobile handset sales grew 7.2% to €3.3 billion. The regulator noted mobile roaming picked up again from the second quarter.

Total investments by the four network operators in France were at €15.5 billion, lower than the €16.2 billion invested in 2020. However, excluding spending on the 5G spectrum, investments rose 10.9% to €14.9 billion. Around €3.6 billion was invested in mobile networks. Investments in very high-speed fixed and mobile local loops were at €á8.5 billion, up 12% compared to 2020.

Operators spent €700 million on frequencies in 2021 compared with €2.8 billion in 2020, the year France held its auction of the 5G-enabling spectrum. A total of 80 million active SIM cards were in use as of 31 December 2021. However, 5G still only accounted for around 3 million users, or 4% of the total, with 4G remaining the dominant technology, representing 82% of all SIM cards in use. Mobile data usage by 4G users increased by around 1GB to an average of 12GB per month.