Each year, the annual report on i2010 – the EU's policy strategy to boost the digital economy by combining research, regulatory tools and public-private partnerships – assesses the economic impact of EU Member States' efforts to deploy ICT, and provides a benchmark on the effectiveness of the Commission's policy to build sustainable economic growth in such technologies. The ICT sector continues to grow faster than Europe's overall economy, according to the i2010 second annual report. ICT contributed nearly 50% of EU productivity growth between 2000 and 2004, with software and IT services currently the most dynamic growth area (5.9% for 2006-2007).

Country report for Slovenia shows good development in the information society indicators.

Broadband take up among households is just below the EU average and is growing at similar rates as Europe as a whole. Overall internet use is also average, and the same applies to the share of household connections that are broadband. Use is close to the EU average for utility services, and above the EU average for media use. The number of eGovernment services fully online is above the EU average, and especially good for citizen services. Enterprise use of eGovernment is above average at both basic and advanced levels.

Whereas the number of broadband connected schools is fairly high, the number of computers and the actual use by teachers lags behind. ICT skills levels in the workforce are slightly above average both for user-level and specialist skills and the number of specialists employed shows continuing improvement. Investment in R&D is lower than average as is the relative share of ICT-related R&D activities. Enterprise connectivity levels have not grown significantly the last year and are now just above average. Use of eBusiness applications is lagging behind and eCommerce growth has been slower than the EU average.

i2010 Annual Report 2007 >>

With 463 million minutes in the fourth quarter of 2006, the results did not reach those of the same quarter of 2005, but they did exceed those of the previous quarter by 6.6%. As regards the direction of calls, data show that national traffic fell only compared to the fourth quarter of 2005, while international traffic decreased in all compared periods.

Table: Traffica na number of subscribers in the fourth quarter of 2006 (Source: SURS)

Statistical Office of the Republic of Slovenia has published new research results on developments of electronic communication services.

Services of calls from a fixed location were until 2004 realized by one operator with its own network, while other operators performed this activity on the basis of its infrastructure. In 2005 three new network operators entered the fixed telephony market – they rented these capacities through the local loop unbundling. On the rapidly developing market of public communication on mobile location five mobile network operators were registered at the end of 2005. Three of them were network operators and two of them performed the services of mobile telephony.

ISDN lines are spreading

The number of main telephone lines, which was from 1998 to 2005 on the increase of 1.7% on average per year, exceeded in this period the number of households as well as the number of dwellings in the country. In 2002 the number of main telephone lines stabilized and in 2005 it can be established that the market of public telephone services on fixed location provided 41 main telephone lines per 100 inhabitants. The share of ISDN lines was only 2% of all telephone lines in 1998 but it increased to 21% in 2005.

Only 13 percent of the population did not use mobile network services in 2005

Measured with the number of paid subscriptions and prepaid systems, the number of users of mobile telephony grew up with a yearly average of 31.6% from 1998 to 2005. Data show that in 1998 only 9.9% of the population used the mobile telephone network. In the next four years the number of users increased enormously. Their number increased by 67.4% on average per year, which means that in 2002 the mobile network was used by 77 out of 100 inhabitants. Later on the rise slowed down: in 2005 87.9% of the population used the mobile network.

The duration of calls form mobile phones is also increasing

The number of employees who created the turnover in the activity of electronic communications services reached its maximum in 2002. After the decrease in 2004 it increased again in 2005 to more than 4,600 employees; almost a third of them were women. In 2005 the volume of total national traffic from the mobile network was 2.2 billion minutes. 82% belonged to the calls within the same mobile network, 13% of calls were directed from one mobile network to another and the rest of the traffic happened from mobile to fixed network. Data on the volume of national calls from the mobile telephone network show that the duration of calls increased on average by 49.5% per year from 1998 to 2005.

Source: SURS, 16.3.2007

The range of telephone service in Slovenia has grown by 5 % in the third quarter of 2006 in comparison with the same period in 2005, established the Statistical Office of RS.

In this period there have been 434 million minutes of conversations through fixed telephone network, which is more than in the same period last year but less than in the second quarter of the year 2006 (476 million minutes).

Mobile phone users and users of mobile services realized altogether 644 million minutes of conversations and surpassed the amount of conversations in the same period last year. Again this was less conversation minutes than in the second quarter of 2006. The conversations were realized by 1,8 million users of the mobile network.

Table: Traffic and number of subscribers in the 3^rd quarter of 2006

	Traffic (minutes)	Subscribers	Prepaid SIM cards
Fixed telephony service	434.139.000	802.478
Mobile telephony service	644.068.000	1.058.473	743.148
Together	1.078.207.000	1.860.951	743.148

Source: Surs, 29. 12. 2006

The survey RIS 2006 showed that there is 880.000 monthly internet users in Slovenia that access the world wide web with PC and 90.000 of those who get on-line with mobile phone. The number of users is still increasing but the growth is slowing down.

The main findings of the survey:

• The users are e-learning (59 %), exchanging files via P2P networks (45 %), using internet telephony (17 %), an increase in e-stats (7 %) and on-line gambling(2 %) was detected.
• There is an increase of those who access the world wide web via mobile phone – 6 % of the Slovenian population
• More users are visiting e-government web sites. Respondents still complain they are not sufficiently informed of the e-government services and there are problems with usability and integration of certificates.
• Goggle is used by 80 % of monthly users, one third of users have g-mail accounts.
• Number of visitors of RTV Slo and24ur – the two main informative portals, and advertising web sites (Bolha, Avto.net) is increasing fast.

E-shopping is in increase in Slovenia

In last 12 months e-shoppers were mostly interested in buying books and magazines (32 %) and computer software (32 %). Furniture/ toys and clothes/ sport equipment were also quite frequently purchased (25 %). It is rather surprising that more clothes and furniture is sold on the internet than travel arrangements and tickets for events. This is even more unusual if we consider the fact that according to the survey the most common barrier for not buying online is in fact the lack of personal contact with the product (looking, touching). 38 % of individuals stated this as a reason for avoiding e-purchase.

E-shopping is more popular by men than women

As expected, e-shoppers are more typically men (19 %) than women (12 %). Recent research done on the field of consumer behavior established that women enjoy shopping in greater extent than men do. For women shopping represents some kind of a ritual and an opportunity for socializing, while men’ goal in shopping is best quality possible for the least money possible. It is thus perfectly logical that men enjoy e-shopping where you can compare the prices without leaving the comfort of the chair in front of the computer screen.

Almost a third of all internet users in would not purchase anything online because they do not feel the need for it. Hesitations on account of safety, privacy, and possibilities of fraud come only as a third reason for not shopping on the internet. Only 20 % of individuals are afraid of this kind of misuse, which is 6 percentage points less than last year. From this we can speculate that e-shopping will see further increase in the future.

Source: Statistical Office, fall 2006

The whole report: ICT in households >> (pdf, 1,14 MB)

The new RIS report Internet and Slovenian government 2006 reveals that monthly internet users are in general satisfied with the role of Slovenian state in development of internet (an increase of 0,2 p.p. in comparison with RIS 2004). They are convinced that development of information society must be an important strategic priority of

High grades for their role in internet development got SiOL (3,8), Microsoft (3,8) and Telekom (3,6). Similarly good grades received Ministry of Higher education, Science and Technology (3,5), Ministry of education and Sport (3,4) and Directorate for information society (3,3). The other political subjects got negative estimations: the lowest were traditionally National Assembly and Government of the Republic of Slovenia . Slovenians are convinced that establishment of publicly available internet access points, cheap internet access and equipping schools with PCs (4,5) is of the same importance as building highways.

Internet users would like more e-government services

Around 13 % of Internet users are visiting State Portal (e-government web site) on monthly basis. The most visited are commune’s web sites (62 %), web sites of ministries (56 %) and web sites of EU agencies (30 %). Almost one third of users have submitted an e-form via Internet (32 %), 24 % users have sent an e-mail to public administration. A significant increase of all activities related to e-government was registered among Slovenian Internet users. Internet users believe they are not sufficiently informed on e-government services (60 %), almost a half of them would like more of these services and a quarter of them are unsatisfied with e-government services. Among those who already used e-government more satisfaction, less complains are even bigger want for more services were detected.

Source: RIS report >> (pdf, 675 KB)

Table: Traffic and number of subscribers in 2nd quarter of 2006 (source: SURS)

	Traffic (minutes)	Subscribers	Prepayed
Fixed telephony	476.037.000	808.021
Mobile telephony	663.635.000	1.010.025	741.200
Together	1.139.672.000	1.818.046	741.200

Source: SURS, 1.9.2006

Source: IDC, 30.8.2006

At the end of 2005 there were 122 registered telecommunications operators. 11 of them are not active yet or are not active any more. Active operators had for 950 millions euro income in 2005. That is 10 % more than in 2004.

Market of public available telephone services is one of the most developed markets in EU. There are 33 registered operators of stationary and internet telephony. The most widespread is analogue telephony which is used by 60 % of households.

Penetration of mobile telephony is 90 %. That is above EU’s average. Mobitel has the highest market share (72 %) and is followed by Simobil (21 %). Others have 7 % of market share. Since the beginning of 2007 it is possible to transfer mobile phone numbers form one operator to the other. Till the beginning of July 2006 there were more than 10.000 numbers transferred.

In March 2006 there were 146.000 xDSL connections to the internet, 46.800 cable and 451.000 modem connections to the internet.

Source: APEK, August 2006