The internet's broad horizons

"[The broadband] segment is growing fast in Poland. I would say that in the big cities in Poland about 50 percent of internet users are using broadband access to the web. And it will continue growing," says independent IT expert Tomasz Kulisiewicz. He underlined that 80-90 percent of the telephone network in Poland is capable of transmitting data using ADSL technology. When digitalization of the system is completed, broadband is expected to take off.

According to The International Telecommunications Union (ITU), broadband internet access is one that enables the user to download data from the internet with the speed of at least 256 Kbps (kilobits per second). In Poland the standards are set lower. Connections of 128 Kbps are already considered broadband. "Every fixed connection to the internet is considered broadband in Poland," Kulisiewicz says.

Far behind

Kulisiewicz reckons that around 20 percent of internet users in the countryside have a fixed connection, compared to 50 percent in the cities. In Poland the total number of people having a fixed connection is around two million. That would mean that roughly around 30 percent of Polish internet users employ broadband connections when surfing the net, since estimates as to the number of Poles having access to the internet vary between 7 and 10 million.

Although the market is developing very quickly in terms of new connections, Poland is still far behind the rest of the world. According to the Boston Consulting Group, in terms of the whole population, only around five percent have broadband access, while the figure stands at around 25 percent in the EU-15, over 30 percent in the US and over 80 percent in South Korea - the global broadband leader.

A matter of time

But things are slowly changing. At the beginning of September cable TV provider UPC Polska introduced a 12 Mbps (megabits per second) internet connection, topping the previous fastest 6 Mbps offered by Telekomunikacja Polska (TP). Although these connections are not standard for most users, UPC Polska's vice-president Marek Sowa stressed that "it's only a matter of time before broadband connections with speeds upwards of 10 Mbps become the service of choice." He also said that this service brings Poland closer to Europe's most advanced markets.

Cable TV operators are a significant force, as well as phone operators' main competitors in the internet business in Poland with over 300,000 users connected. However, the cable operators' main disadvantage is that they are limited to metropolitan areas and larger cities.

Kulisiewicz sees another potential internet supplier, which could become serious competition for the phone and cable operators. "Municipal utility providers have the necessary infrastructure and one can only be surprised that they are not using it," Kulisiewcz said. In Wrocław the heat distribution network is used to provide internet access to over 12,000 flats. "All one needs is to put fiberglass in the network" Kulisiewicz explains.