The Dutch fixed telephony market grew by almost 34,700 connections during the third quarter of 2011 to 5.99 million. While there was a 4.7 percent drop in PSTN/ISDN connections to 1.45 million, the number of Dutch consumer VoIP subscriptions grew 2.7 percent during the third quarter, to 4.23 million on 30 September. The growth was driven by cable VoIP, which grew by 4.0 percent during the quarter to 2.18 million lines, according to Telecompaper's quarterly Dutch Fixed Telephony Market report. DSL reported a quarterly increase of just 0.1 percent to 1.85 million lines. The remaining VoIP lines were used by FTTH/B customers. Telecompaper expects the fixed telephony market to grow by 0.7 percent over the full year 2011, with over 10 percent growth in VoIP lines offsetting the continued decrease in PSTN/ISDN and WLR users. Growth will be driven by more operators offering triple-play packages via multiple networks, as KPN brands XS4ALL and Telfort are doing with their triple-play offers via VDSL and FTTH and Vodafone has started over FTTH, the market researcher said. Telecompaper expects Tele2 and T-Mobile Online to follow Vodafone's example.
