D.Grishkin

Megafon launched 3G networks on the streets of Moscow and the Moscow region a little earlier than its competitors – on December 14, 2009. Oleg Klochko, Commercial Director of Megafon’s Moscow branch, says that in the last quarter of last year, Internet traffic in the Moscow network grew more than twofold. At the same time, 3G traffic accounts for about 20% of all data downloaded and sent by Megafon subscribers.

Tubes instead of PC. 1.82

billion mobile phones and smartphones supporting wireless Internet access will be in use worldwide by 2013, Gartner predicts. According to its analysts, the mobile phone will become the most popular means of accessing the Internet, overtaking the computer in popularity (according to Gartner, 1.78 billion will be in use by 2013).

VimpelCom and MTS launched commercial operation of 3G networks on the streets of Moscow almost simultaneously – on December 28 and 29, 2009, respectively. According to MTS press secretary Irina Osadchaya, in the network sections where 2G and 3G equipment already operate jointly, data traffic has grown two to three times (compared to the volume of traffic before the launch of 3G). As of January 15, 2010, MTS had 250 base stations operating in Moscow, covering the territory inside the Third Transport Ring and part of the city districts within the Moscow Ring Road.

VimpelCom also monitored data traffic for the period from December 29 and recorded its “steady increase by 2.5-3 times,” said the company’s press secretary Ksenia Korneeva. She did not name the number of 3G base stations operating in Moscow, recalling only that VimpelCom had received permission to operate 1,000 such devices. Currently, the operator’s 3G network primarily covers the territory within the Garden Ring.

None of the operators disclose absolute data traffic figures. Their representatives also do not predict how the growth of traffic will affect the companies' income. According to iKS-Consulting, at the end of 2009, there were 430,000 users of USB modems in Moscow (the owners of these devices are the most active users of the mobile Internet). Before the advent of 3G networks, each such user consumed, according to iKS-Consulting, about 350 MB per month and paid an average of 285 rubles per month for this.

Frost & Sallivan's Business Development Director in Russia, Tatyana Tolmacheva, assumes that the growth rate of Moscow mobile operators' revenues from data transmission will be lower than the growth rate of wireless traffic. With a threefold increase in traffic volumes, revenue from its transmission may grow by 1.5-2 times, she believes. Wireless Internet traffic in Moscow is getting cheaper: over the past year, the cost of 1 MB of data in mobile networks has decreased by about half, she explains. In addition, unlimited tariff plans may reduce the profitability of mobile Internet, Tolmacheva continues. MTS and Megafon have already introduced them.

Megafon offers unlimited mobile Internet for 1,100 rubles per month, although after downloading 5 GB the speed drops to 128 Kbps. MTS has introduced two unlimited tariffs – 900 rubles and 1,400 rubles per month. Initially, the access speed for their subscribers is 128 Kbps and 512 Kbps respectively, but it drops to 64 Kbps if the subscriber has downloaded more than 3 GB in three days. However, Tolmacheva does not expect a tariff war in Moscow similar to the one waged by participants in the Moscow fixed-line Internet access market two or three years ago. Cellular companies do not have many frequencies in Moscow to serve many 3G users at once, she recalls.

The third generation of mobile communications has brought its first dividends