The report shows that fixed communications service revenue across APAC is expected to expand at a CAGR of 1% from 2025 to 2030
In sum – what to know:
Fiber remains APAC’s core growth engine – Despite modest overall revenue expansion, fiber-based broadband adoption will keep rising, especially in emerging markets supported by major public-sector investments.
Developed and emerging APAC both near full-fiber environments – Forecasts show fiber reaching 87% of fixed lines in developed APAC and about 90% in emerging markets by 2030 thanks to network upgrades and bundled offers.
Voice revenue continues downward despite access stability – Even with a gradual shift to VoIP, fixed voice revenue will decline as mobile and OTT communication substitute traditional fixed telephony.
Fiber will maintain its position as the dominant fixed communications technology in the Asia-Pacific (APAC) market through 2030, according to new projections from GlobalData.
GlobalData’s latest APAC fixed communications forecast report shows that fixed communications service revenue across the region is expected to expand at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 1% from 2025 to 2030. The expansion will be driven primarily by ongoing gains in fixed broadband connections — especially in emerging markets—where fiber continues to lead subscriber additions.
The report also notes that the region remains a moderately mature region for fixed broadband, with an estimated penetration of 22.6% by the end of 2025. That figure is forecast to rise to 24.6% by 2030 as operators extend network reach and governments invest heavily in broadband infrastructure in countries such as the Philippines, Malaysia and India.
GlobalData highlighted Malaysia’s JENDELA Phase 2 program, which has boosted broadband availability to nearly 98% of populated areas and delivered fiber access to more than 9.48 million premises as of July 2025. India is also accelerating Phase 3 of BharatNet, supported by nearly $18 billion in funding to bring fiber to additional villages and subsidized access to millions of rural households, with completion targeted for 2027.
More developed APAC markets—including Australia, New Zealand and Singapore—already show high penetration levels, supported by nationwide broadband network initiatives, according to the research firm.
“By 2030, fiber-optic access lines will account for a share of about 87% of the total fixed access lines in the developed APAC region, while their share in the total fixed lines in the emerging APAC markets will be slightly higher at 90%. Rising demand for high-speed internet services and competitively priced fiber broadband plans from operators with benefits like unlimited internet and access to major subscription video on demand (SVoD) platforms will drive the fiber broadband service adoption in the region,” said Kantipudi Pradeepthi, telecom analyst at GlobalData,
China remains the largest fiber broadband market in APAC, with around 99% of broadband connections delivered via fiber as of 2025. In early 2025, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) launched pilot initiatives for 10-gigabit optical networks, including the creation of “10-gigabit communities.” These programs aim to support applications across cloud computing, cloud gaming, UHD video, optical-sensor home security and smart elderly-care services.
Voice telephony access in APAC is expected to remain flat at around 10% through 2030. Circuit-switched voice will decline at a CAGR of 1.7%, while packet-switched lines will rise at 2.8% as fiber deployments encourage users to migrate to VoIP. Even so, fixed voice revenue will continue to shrink, with OTT and mobile calling increasingly eroding traditional voice usage, according to the report.
“Despite the increase in the overall voice telephony access lines in the region, fixed voice revenue will continue to decline over the forecast period on account of the increasing mobile voice and OTT voice usage,” the analyst added.
OECD recently said that OECD economies have undergone rapid digital transformation between 2019 and 2024, driven by fiber, 5G, fixed wireless access (FWA) and satellite broadband.
Over five years, gigabit broadband offers grew 4.5 times — from 4% in 2019 to 19% in 2024 — while mobile data usage more than doubled to 15 GB per subscription per month, according to the OECD report. Fiber now accounts for 47% of all fixed broadband subscriptions, up from 28% in 2019, and has overtaken legacy copper and cable technologies, it added.
