Abstract
Since its entrance into the diverse Asia telecommunication market in the late
1990s, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) has gained fast recognition and
tremendous success. In many countries, with regulatory support, VoIP long
distance calling volumes surged while service providers were bearing
significant price reductions. In saturated and competitive fixed-line markets
like Japan and Hong Kong, fast movers such as Yahoo!BB and Hong Kong Broadband
Network introduced local VoIP lines to lure subscribers. The incentives were
price advantages and the convenience of a single line for converged voice and
data services. On the contrary, poor adoption of VoIP is observed in countries
where the regulator over-protected incumbents with unfavorable VoIP policies.
Nevertheless, counting on countries where VoIP is active--Australia, China,
Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan, and Thailand--Asia
registered a volume of about 175.2 billion minutes VoIP calls in 2004. Backed
by clear evidence of continuous call migration from PSTN to IP platform, total
VoIP calling minutes are expected to reach 484.2 billion by 2009. Over the
same time, VoIP service revenue will rise from US$5.5 billion to US$10.8. At
the country level, this report describes the latest status development of VoIP
markets and assesses market regulatory enablers, major players, scales of VoIP
businesses, and revenue trend.
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