And even more significantly Japan mobile operators had signed up 68 million 3G subscribers by March 2008. Its promotion of FttH as a broadband platform has been a crucial factor in its continuing leadership role.

Asia continues to claim the rank of world’s largest regional Internet market. With an estimated 580 million Internet users (a user penetration of 16 percent) by early 2008, Asia was extending its lead over Europe (385 million) and North America (250 million). It comes as no surprise that Internet applications in Asia are being led by the developed economies of the region - Japan, Hong Kong, South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan.

This group has been joined by China, with its user penetration of 16 percent, and a massive 210 million Internet users by the start of 2008, according to ITU estimates. Although the published statistics varied, one source had China with 253 million Internet subscribers by June 2008; this compared with 248 million in the US.

South Korea continues to dominate the area of broadband Internet access, leading the world and the region with 90 percent of its households having a broadband connection by early 2008. The two major technologies supporting broadband in Asia are DSL and cable modem, with DSL having the ascendancy. For the time being, DSL dominates by a factor of 2:1. The market is changing, however, with the rapid roll-out of FttH in a number of the more highly developed markets.

As the local economies across Asia gained traction and national regulators continue to restructure their markets, telcos have been facing increasingly competitive markets. Price cutting has been widespread, the offering of value-added services has been expanding and innovative product promotion and packaging remain popular. Working in such highly competitive markets, ARPU across the product range has experienced strong downward pressure, but some equilibrium was achieved over the 2007/08.

In the meantime, with the introduction of 3G services and other VAS platforms, some operators have seized the opportunity to grow their ARPU again. Nevertheless, profit margins have been falling and operators need to be flexible to stay competitive in a quickly changing market. More significantly, the increased likelihood of a global recession will present even greater challenges.