Emerging Markets: The View from Latin America

As the economy globalizes and emerging markets increase their participation in the global economy (and their relevance in the communications, information and digital media industries), so does TM Forum’s member structureHistorically, TM Forum membership has drawn more heavily from North America and Western Europe, however membership from other markets, such as Asia and Latin America has been increasing. TM Forum has been taking important steps in order to better serve this growing presence in emerging markets and continues to be very committed to these regions in 2009 and beyond.

The Latin American market is of particular importance for TM Forum. Service provider membership in this region covers countries such as Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Mexico, Puerto Rico, Uruguay and Venezuela.

Here are just a few examples of TM Forum’s reach into this important part of the world. In October 2008, the Forum held a one-day summit at Futurecom in Brazil, which was tremendously popular.TM Forum produces an online newsletter in Spanish (Inside Latin America) and has the capability to deliver training courses in Spanish and Portuguese.

The most recent addition to TM Forum’s activity in Latin America is a series of upcoming one-day, country-specific and free of charge – Regional Spotlights – an opportunity for TM Forum members and non-members to come together to discuss business issues affecting digital media and communication services in their region, share successful solutions and strategies and network with their peers.

The Regional Spotlight events will come to São Paulo, Brazil on May 25 and, for the first time in TM Forum’s history, Buenos Aires, Argentina on June 22.

The Brazilian and Argentinean Markets At-a-Glance

The news is full of stories about the financial crisis and recession. But each market has shown a slightly different scenario. Brazil, Latin America's largest economy, may have reached the bottom and has started to rebound, despite the fact that the government has cut its growth forecast for this year from 2 percent to 1.2 percent. Although Brazil's economy could see a contraction in its GDP this year, its growth is expected to return at around 3 percent in 2010.

Brazil had 41.3 million fixed lines (penetration rate of 21.7 per 100 inhabitants), 150.6 million mobile phones (penetration rate of 78.1 per 100 inhabitants) and 10 million broadband connections and 53.9 million Internet users in 2008. Brazil is between the top 5 main cellular markets in the word, behind China, the U.S., India and Russia, and bigger than Japan. Brazil represents 33.5 percent of Latin America’s mobile market, 41.4 percent of Internet users and 40.6 percent of broadband subscribers.

Argentina, Latin America's third largest economy, has slowed sharply after 6 consecutive years of at least 7 percent annual growth. But according to recently released statistics, Argentina's economy grew at 2.6 percent in February compared with the same month last year, which is above the 2 percent median forecast. Argentina had 46.509 million mobile phones in 2008 (penetration rate stands at 117 percent, out of which 89.6 percent are prepaid) and 9.015 million fixed lines (penetration rate is 22.7 percent).