Continuing its downward trend from the last three years, Singapore’s mobile services revenue is expected to decline by 18% in 2020 due to the adverse impact of COVID-19 pandemic on the mobile subscription growth and partly due to the competition induced decline in mobile tariffs, according to GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.

GlobalData’s Singapore Telecom Operators Country Intelligence Report shows that mobile subscriptions will decline by 0.7% in 2020 due to COVID-19 prompted ‘circuit breaker’ lockdowns imposed in the country, which impacted gross additions. Free mobile services extended by operators to support subscribers amidst the pandemic also hit the mobile average revenue per user (ARPU) and dragged down mobile service revenues during the year.

Deepa Dhingra, Telecom Analyst at GlobalData, says: “The entry of a new operator in 2019 and the subsequent mobile tariff wars induced by competition also hit the mobile ARPU levels and revenue in the country during the year.”

Mobile service revenues will however see an upward trend from 2021 and increase at a compounded annual growth rate of 6.8% over the forecast period 2019-2025, driven by recovery in mobile subscription growth and anticipated growth in the adoption of higher ARPU yielding 5G services over the forecast period.

Ms Dhingra concludes: “4G will remain the leading technology to provide mobile services in Singapore during the forecast period. However, 4G’s share in the total mobile subscriptions will decline from 88.5% in 2020 to 61.4% by the end of 2025 as mobile users start migrating to 5G services. GlobalData expects 5G service subscriptions to account for 37.5% share in the total mobile subscriptions by 2025-end as the build out of 5G networks reach mature stage.

“SingTel will continue to lead the mobile services market in terms of mobile subscriptions over the forecast period, supported by its strong focus on machine-to-machine/ Internet of Things (M2M/IoT) segment and 5G network roll out.”