WASHINGTON
The Federal Communications Commission today released the 2014 International Telecommunications Traffic and Revenue Data Report. The report from the FCC’s International Bureau provides information on telecommunications services between the United States and international points as of December 31, 2014. For the first time, the report includes data on Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) service connected to the public switched telephone network between the United States and any foreign point.
The report also presents data on minutes of traffic completed and settlement payouts for call completion on foreign fixed networks and foreign mobile networks. Additionally, it includes certain traffic and revenue data broken down by customer class, namely, residential and business customers.
Notable highlights of the report include:
- The number of providers filing traffic and revenue reports increased by 30 percent. The number of providers increased from 1,457 in the previous report to 1,896 in this report, which includes, for the first time, 354 Interconnected VoIP Service providers.
- Total revenues from U.S. consumers decreased compared to previous years (even with the increased number of providers filing in this report). U.S. International Service Providers billed U.S. customers $3.87 billion for 73.6 billion minutes in 2013. U.S. International Service Providers billed U.S. customers $3.7 billion for 84.7 billion minutes in 2014.
- Of the total 84.7 billion minutes billed in 2014, 49.4 billion minutes were completed on foreign fixed-line networks, and 35.3 billion minutes were completed on foreign mobile networks.
- U.S. International Service Providers incurred approximately $2.6 billion in settlement payouts; $1.0 billion were for minutes completed on foreign fixed-line networks, and $1.5 billion were for minutes completed on foreign mobile networks.
- Calls to three countries accounted for about 63 percent of the outgoing international U.S.-billed minutes. The top three routes with the highest international U.S.-billed minutes in 2014 were U.S.-India (24.8 percent), U.S.-Mexico (23.7 percent), and U.S.-Canada (14.2 percent).
- Private line 64 kilobits per second equivalent circuits grew more than seven hundred-fold from 687,000 in 2000 to 113 million by 2014.