Budapest,
October 15, 2020
14:00
The first Hungarian
commercial mobile service was launched in Hungary thirty years ago thus we have
been using mobile phones in Hungary for three decades. Three decades later the
rapidly expanding data need of customers and the growing number of devices connected
to the network determines the mobile market. This is why this spring Telekom
launched the fifth generation mobile technology. The gigabit speed 5G service
is now partially* available to customers in 23 locations.
On
October 15, 1990, the analogue 450 MHz radiotelephone service was launched by
Westel Rádiótelefon (later Westel 0660) Kft., which was established as a joint
venture between Magyar Telekom's legal predecessor, Matáv, and US West
International. It was also the first commercial mobile service in Central
Europe. This was followed in 1994 by the second generation (2G) GSM-based
service launched by Westel 900 (later T-Mobile Hungary, thenMagyar Telekom)in the 900 MHz band. The GSM system, compared to
the analogue service, provided customers with
better quality voice, higher network capacity, the ability to send text
messages (SMS), voicemail and roaming. T-Mobile was also the first to launch the 3G mobile service in Hungary
in 2005, enabling the use of high-quality multimedia applications, video
telephony, mobile TV and high-speed mobile internet.
The real
experience of mobile internet was finally brought by the next, fourth
generation (4G/LTE) service, which Telekom has been offering to customers from
the beginning of 2012. This technology still plays a significant role in
servicing customers, as according to NMHH’s data in the 2019 Q4 96,3% of the
total domestic mobile internet traffic and 25,2% of the domestic call traffic
took place through 4G networks. Telekom provides high-quality 4G services in
almost the entire territory of Hungary, in 3,120 settlements and its outdoor 4G
coverage exceeds 99% while the indoor 4G coverage is close to 90%.
It has
always been important for Telekom to make the latest technologies available to
its customers as soon as possible. Therefore, shortly after its successful
participation in the 5G frequency auction, the company launched its commercial
5G service in April this year, which now offers gigabit speed mobilnet* in 16
settlements at Lake Balaton and in 5 county capitals (Zalaegerszeg, Debrecen,
Szeged, Kecskemét and Szombathely) in addition to Budapest and Budaörs. In addition to 5G network coverage one needs a
5G-capable device and a suitable mobile data package to use it. From September
4 Telekom offers the 5G service available in two unlimited data packages as a
default service. Telekom plans to further increase its 5G coverage
by the end of the year. Enabling much higher data transmission rates, low
latency and connectivity to a wide range of network devices the 5G technology
will offer new opportunities for both industrial use and in people's daily
lives.
The
annual voice traffic is still growing on Telekom's mobile network and is
expected to reach 10 billion minutes this year, while in 2015 it was
approximately 9 billion minutes. The annual data traffic is growing much
steeper than voice, it grew with more than eight times then it was five years
ago, growing with 60% in the second quarter of this year compared to last
year’s Q2 data. Telekom customers have used an average of 5,5 GB of data per
month so far in 2020.
The unbroken success of mobile telephony is shown by
the fact that there are a total of 11,3 million activated SIM cards in Hungary
today. Magyar Telekom has maintained its market leading position from the very
beginning, with a market share of 44,8% at the end of 2019. The number of SIM
cards in Telekom's network is nearly 5,4 million (almost 65% of them are
postpaid) and the number of mobile broadband subscriptions is 3,18 million.
*Partial settlement
coverage. The maximum download speed offered by the 5G service is 1 Gbps, the achievement
of which depends on the availability of a device with sufficient capability and
support for the given technology; i.e. whether the network supports the given
speed and whether the radio and traffic conditions are sufficient.
The most important milestones of Telekom's mobile
services in the last 25 years were as follows:
-
October 15, 1990:
launch of Westel 450's analogue mobile service, the first commercial mobile
service in Hungary and Central Europe.
-
1994: a joint venture between Matáv and US West, Westel
900 (T-Mobile from 2004, Magyar Telekom from 2006) and Pannon GSM, a
Scandinavian-Hungarian company (now Telenor Hungary) launched their GSM digital
service (2G) in the 900 MHz band.
-
1995: The first SMS in Hungary was sent on te Westel 900
network. In the last 25 years, Telekom's customers have sent nearly 12 billion
SMS messages.
-
1999: The third mobile operator, Vodafone Hungary, enters the market.
-
2000: Westel 900 has more than 1 million customers.
-
2001: Westel launched the GPRS service, a
packet-switched data service that offers mobile internet and the use of
multimedia applications, offering the speed of up to 30 Kbit/s.
-
2002: for the first time the number of mobile phone
subscribers exceeded the number of fixed telephone lines at Telekom Group;
Telekom is the first service provider in the world to introduce multimedia
messaging (MMS) for text, image, audio and video content.
-
2003: 450 MHz (0660) the analogue mobile service was
phased out, existing customers were migrated to GSM.
-
2004: Westel took the name of T-Mobile, the official
name of the company became T-Mobile Magyarország Távközlési Rt.
-
2005: T-Mobile launched the third-generation (3G) mobile
network with UMTS system enabling high-quality multimedia applications, video
telephony, mobile TV and high-speed mobile internet - first in Hungary.
-
2006: Magyar Telekom Rt. and T-Mobile Magyarország Rt.
have merged, and as of March 1, 2006 the legal successor of T-Mobile
Magyarország Rt., Magyar Telekom Plc. launched the high-speed downlink packet
access (HSDPA) service (3 Mbps download speed) which has led to a rapid
increase in the number of mobile internet subscribers.
-
2008: Magyar Telekom was the first in the country to
offer television, internet and telephone on both fixed and mobile networks as a
“triple-play” service provider, and it was the first to sell smartphones.
-
2009: Telekom was the first in Hungary to test the new
generation 4G / LTE technology.
-
2012: The introduction of Telekom's commercial 4G service, as the first in the
domestic market..
-
2014: With Telekom's LTE-Advanced (4G +) test network the next stage of mobile
technology was made available in Hungary; Telekom's nationwide retail 4G
coverage exceeded 78%.
-
2015: Telekom's retail 4G coverage reached 97% by the
end of the year; Telekom's 4G mobile internet network achieved the best test
results in independent international and domestic measurements and tests. From
July 2015 the 4G data traffic permanently and increasingly exceeds 3G data
traffic on Telekom's network.
-
2016: Telekom has started to cover small settlements
with 4G technology and within a year the super high speed mobile internet
reached more than 2,600 settlements with a population under 6,000. Meanwhile
the company's 300 Mbps 4G+ service has been made available in more than 40
locations. Telekom made a test call on a 4G network (VoLTE - Voice-over-LTE
technology). At the end of 2016 70% of the mobile data traffic is managed on
the 4G network.
-
2017: Telekom was the first mobile operator in Hungary
to launch voice services on a 4G network (VoLTE - Voice-over-LTE technology).
Magyar Telekom has started the construction of a 5G test network at the
automotive test track in Zalaegerszeg. Ericsson and Magyar Telekom introduced
the first 5G connection in Hungary.
-
2018: Telekom was the first in the domestic market to
use built-in SIM cards (eSIM) in its network. Telekom was the first in Hungary
to offer MultiSIM (one subscription for several devices). Magyar Telekom was
the first to present a real-time 5G network in Hungary in Magyar Telekom's
headquarters in Krisztina körút, Budapest. In 2018 Magyar Telekom was the
largest mobile phone and tablet seller in the Hungarian online retail market -
based on GKI Digital's market analysis..
-
2019: Magyar Telekom launched Hungary's first standard
5G test station in Zalaegerszeg. According to the independent measurements of
the international consulting company P3, Magyar Telekom's mobile network once
again achieved the best overall result in voice and data services among the
domestic mobile service providers for the fourth time. In 2019, Magyar
Telekom was again the largest seller of mobile phones and tablets in the
Hungarian online retail market, according to GKI Digital's market analysis.
-
2020: Magyar Telekom successfully participated in the 5G frequency auction, and
shortly thereafter launched its commercial 5G service.