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Azerbaijan to invest $4bln in ICT

17 April 2014 12:00 (UTC+04:00)
Azerbaijan to invest $4bln in ICT

By Nigar Orujova

Investment in the development of the ICT sector in Azerbaijan is expected to rise to $4 billion by 2020.

The news was announced by Ali Abbasov, Communications and High Technologies Minister, who talked to local media, on April 16.

"In accordance with the 'Azerbaijan 2020: Vision for the Future' development concept, the volume of the ICT sector in the country will increase 4.5-5 times at an average annual growth rate of 15-20 percent," he said.

Abbasov stressed that Azerbaijan's ICT sector revenues will amount to $8-8.5 billion by 2020, about 10 percent of the GDP.

He also noted that the development project of broadband Internet will initially cover 2014-2016 in Azerbaijan.

The Azerbaijani State Oil Fund is going to allocate about 103 million manats ($131 million) to the implementation of the project in the first stage.

The cost of the 'Fiber to the home' project is estimated at more than 450 million manats ($573 million). The project is considered highly profitable. Around 30-35 percent of its total cost will be financed through reinvestments beginning at the second year of its implementation.

The ultimate goal of the project is to provide the whole country, including remote rural settlements, with high-speed Internet in the range of 30-100 Mbit/s, and bring the number of broadband Internet users up to 85 percent.

This will allow Azerbaijan to reach the level of developed countries by 2017.

At present, around 70 percent of the population uses the Internet in Azerbaijan, and the penetration rate of broadband Internet among the population is 50 percent.

ICT income in 2014

The amount of income received from the ICT sector and postal services in Azerbaijan amounted to 381 million manats ($485 million) in the first quarter of 2014, increased on 13.3 percent for the year, according to the ministry.

The growth rate of the ICT sector in the country amounted to 13.1 percent compared with the same period last year; where the growth by the IT sector is 23.6 percent, and the postal sector increase is six percent.

Over 78 percent of revenues from the ICT sector and postal services accounted for non-government communications enterprises. The overall share of income from these sectors in GDP amounted to 1.9 percent in the first quarter of 2014.

Last year, Azerbaijan invested about 202.2 million manats (over $257 million) in the ICT sector and postal services.

Azerbaijan's revenues for the ICT sector and postal services amounted to 1.632.2 billion manats in 2013, which is 14 percent more than 2012.

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