According to a new report from Digital TV Research, the number of fixed broadband households worldwide will hit 745 million by 2017 – up from the figure of 578m by the end of 2012.

Further, the research predicts that of the 167m additions, China will supply 73m and India 22m. Given 2010’s figure was 473m, this represents solid year-on-year growth.

By 2017, it is expected that China will have just over 250m fixed broadband households. The USA remains second on 100.9m, with Japan (40.6m), India (37.9m) and Germany (30.4m) comprising the top five.

Elsewhere, fixed broadband household penetration will hit 49.2% by 2017. The current figure for the end of 2012 is expected to be 40.3%.

Yet the report also revealed a worrying discrepancy in certain countries – household penetration in South Korea will be 93.7%, as opposed to just 14.0% in India and Indonesia. This is perhaps not entirely surprising given India’s telecoms structure is under plenty of scrutiny right now – especially concerning the recent difficulty with the 2G spectrum auctions.

Need for speed

The report also focussed upon different trends on broadband speeds.

This isn’t the only research which has looked at this recently; a UK-based report from wireless comparison providers uSwitch.com showed a “massive discrepancy” between certain streets for broadband speed, with the lowest recorded download speed at 0.132Mbps.

However, globally and in terms of fixed broadband speed, Digital TV Research predicts a big change in average speeds between now and 2017.

Whereas in 2012 58% of fixed broadband speeds will be lower than 10Mbps, that figure is expected to fall to 31% by 2017 – arguably a result for improved infrastructure.

The report notes that the decline in households which have less than 2Mbps broadband speed will fall dramatically; halving to 71.7 million.

India’s number of households which will have under 2Mbps will actually increase, going up from 6.6m to 11.4m by 2017. The USA, however, is predicted to have no houses under 2Mbps by 2017.

Report author Simon Murray noted the slow start the US will have before coming strong.

Murray told TelecomsTech: “I think that a major finding from the report was just how slow broadband speeds are in the US compared with many countries – operators have been slow to upgrade.

“However, similar to cable operators’ adoption of digital, this situation will change rapidly with average US speeds expected to rank among the top countries by the end of the forecast period,” he added.

Do you agree with these broadband forecasts?