Today the ICT sector in Azerbaijan is the fastest growing sector of the national economy. This is testified by the data provided by the Ministry of Communications and Information Technologies which indicate that the ICT has increased by five times over the recent period and the average annual growth rate made up 30-35 percent. Despite the global financial-economic crisis, in 2009 the development dynamics were preserved and made up 13.7 percent. The growth totaled 32.1 percent in 2010. The share of the private sector increased from 70.7 percent to 80.3 percent due to the creation of the favorable competition environment.
Significant success was achieved in this area. The latest example: Azerbaijan became the first this year amongst the CIS countries, the express service of postal operator of which has been presented with the award of the Universal Postal Union (UPU). Postal Express Service Azerexpresspost of Azerbaijan's Azerpocht state postal service operator received a gold certificate of UPU. The certificate was presented during the spring session of the UPU, which was held from April 26 to May 13 in Bern.
In January-April 2011, significant growth was also recorded. Thus, the amount of information and communication services rendered to organizations and population in Azerbaijan in January-April 2011 totaled 383.1 million manat, or 18.7 percent more than the same period of last year. About 74.1 percent fell on share of services rendered to population.
About 63.8 percent of revenues accounted for mobile services, of which growth increased by 8.3 percent compared to the last year's indicators and totaled 244.6 million manat.
The number of mobile communication subscribers is constantly increases due to the tense activities of the mobile operators in the country that constantly raise the quality of their services. Thus, the number of active subscribers of Bakcell mobile communication company in Azerbaijan reached 2.5 million. The company's network operates 2,000 base stations, allowing to cover 98.7 percent of the Republic's territory, including remote regions. The network of Bakcell covers more than 95 percent of the population and 82 percent of the country's territory. In general, due to investments, the capacity of the network infrastructure of Bakcell was increased four times.
Azercell Company has been operating in the mobile services market since 1995, today the number of company's subscribers has reached 4.2 million people, of whom 300,000 joined the network of operator last year. At present Azercell's network covers 80 percent of the territory and 99.8 percent of the population of Azerbaijan.
The coverage area of the youngest mobile communication company in Azerbaijan, Azerfon, is 80 percent and the number of subscribers - 1.7 million.
Azerbaijani Statistics State Committee also notes an increase in the rate of production of ICT equipment in the country. Thus, in January-April 2011, computer, electronic and optical equipment was produced in the country in amount of 40.9 million manat.
The level of Internet penetration in the country today has reached 50 percent, of which 15 percent are users of broadband Internet.
According to the Ministry of Communications and Information Technologies of Azerbaijan, the number of connections to the network increased by 9,160 units, reaching 26,188 units. Broadband Internet of AztelekomNet is available in 51 cities.
As of May 23, the largest amount of traffic delivered to the end user accounted for the public internet service provider BakinterNet (22.09 percent), the second for the Uninet Company (14.57 percent), the third - the Azeronline Company - 10.94 percent.
Further, in terms of traffic, the providers seem to be as: Stellford (trademark Connect) - 9.85 percent, DATAPlus - 7.70 percent, Superonline - 7.18 percent, Ultel - 5.57 percent, ADaNet - 3.48 percent, Aztelekom - 3.15 percent, AzStarNet - 2.92 percent, AzEuroTel - 2.18 percent, SMART - 2.16 percent, Avirtel - 1.43 percent, AzNET - 1.07 percent, TransEuroCom - 1.04 percent, Nakhchivan - 0.93 percent, DataCell - 0.85 percent, Information and Computing Center of the Ministry of Communications and Information Technologies of Azerbaijan - 0.82 percent, Caspel - 0.74 percent, Bakcell - 0.37 percent, IntraNS - 0.35 percent, AzIntex - 0.27 percent, QlobalNet - 0.12 percent, Castel - 0.11 percent, Azerin - 0.08 percent and Azerfon - 0 percent.