By Adlane Fellah, Senior Analyst & Founder at Maravedis Wireless Research
In the run up to the Wi-Fi World Congress Americas in Rio de Janeiro this March 27-29, we’re zooming in on the Brazilian Wi-Fi market including market opportunities & challenges for the thousands of Brazilian ISPs. One of our valued partners for the event is Abrint, Brazil’s main trade association for ISPs. Here’s our interview with Sidnei Batistella, Director VP of Abrint. Sidnei will be speaking at the WWC Rio.
Can you tell us briefly about Abrint?
Abrint is Brazil’s main trade association for ISPs. Formed in 2008 as a voluntary association, Abrint has been at the forefront of industry efforts to shape telecommunications policy, to promote competition and the positive development of the Internet industry in Brazil.
As a nationally recognized Internet industry representative body, Abrint actively serves to facilitate exchange between ISPs, government bodies, operators, and other interested stakeholders. Currently, we represent over 1400 associated companies that play an essential role in promoting meaningful connectivity in all 27 Brazilian states.
What are your member priorities for 2023?
“Brazil Internet access industry is quite unique: Brazil has over 20,000 ISPs but only 3 have country-wide coverage and 40% of the companies have up to 5 thousand customers. It is a highly competitive and heterogenous marketplace, driven by small and medium regional companies. As of December 2022, regional ISPs account for over 50% market share in Brazil.” – Abrint.
As such, most of our members are small or medium companies. Most of their priorities for 2023 revolve around improving management. They are looking to professionalize their finance and tax management, along with putting the right internal processes in place so their companies can continue to grow. Brazilian ISPs are also very concerned about customer loyalty and adding new products to their service packages.
How important is Wi-Fi for your members and/or Brazil in general? What are the main challenges/opportunities in Wi-Fi in Brazil in your opinion?
“For the residential market, I believe this means that the greatest challenge for Brazilian ISPs right now is to deliver great quality Wi-Fi inside all rooms of a house.” – Abrint.
Wi-Fi is very important to Brazilian ISPs. Official surveys show that mobile devices are (by far) the preferred option for going online in Brazil. Even recently, FTTH was the best competitive advantage an ISP could have. ISPs would deliver a fixed fibre access in the living room and the customer would be happy. The big challenge now is to think about his mobile experience: If the Wi-Fi signal is not good enough around the house, the customer will look for a new ISP. So, ISPs now need to organise themselves to provide Wi-Fi help desks and develop new products or features to add to their service packages.
What is your ISP member’s strategy regarding Wi-Fi 6 and 6E? What is the current adoption of Wi-Fi 6 among your ISP members?
I believe Wi-Fi 6 and specially 6E will be an integral part of improving inside-the-home connectivity. There is a lot of buzz around 5G in Brazil right now. With Wi-Fi 6, ISPs will be able to offer similar speed and latency to the customer, but at a much faster implementation rate as it will take years for 5G mobile networks to arrive in smaller cities.
However, adoption is currently very low. This is because affordability is a very big issue. Hardware prices are still very high – I was recently in a big US tech event and equipment was being sold for around US$ 300. That is too expensive for Brazilian ISPs even before you add exchange and import costs!
Right now, our main strategy is to get as many companies as possible to come together and show there is solid demand for Wi-Fi 6 so that manufacturers can deliver better costs than what is available on the market today. I believe adoption in Brazil will come fast, but in waves. Firstly, it will be used as P2P connection, where there isn’t enough demand to justify investments in fibre. As equipment prices drop, we will see a fast second wave adoption for multipoint communications.
How do ISPs think about improving NPS (net promoter score) with customers?
When it comes to customer loyalty, Brazilian ISPs have realised that they need to think beyond FTTH and become an integral part of the customers day-to-day life. The main strategies for this are twofold: They are looking to improve the quality of Wi-Fi signals inside the customers’ home or companies, as well as adding new features or services to their bundle deals.
On the side of quality, ISPs have focused on improving technical support services. We aim to provide great internet access, as well as full Wi-Fi signal in all rooms in the customers’ house. Brazilian regional ISPs also have a reputation for great customer services, as we aim to make contacting our companies as easy as possible.
More recently, ISPs are giving more attention to adding new products and services to their bundle deals: We can provide more than Internet access to our customers! This means offering TV services from IPTV, mobile services through MVNO technologies as well as VOD platforms including educational products, movies, music and others. So, our customers come for the internet access, but will stay loyal because of all the extra features and services we provide.
What are your expectations for the Wi-Fi World Congress in Rio de Janeiro this March?
I have high expectations and l am looking forward to learning about new Wi-Fi technologies and products. I am very interested in taking part in discussions around IoT, new devices and the best strategies for improving Wi-Fi quality and connectivity.
/Sidnei Batistella.
