Significant differences have been found in mobile network coverage in the archipelagos of Madeira and the Azores, between operators, technologies and according to the type of locations analysed. This is according to an assessment study on quality of service carried out by ANACOM - Autoridade Nacional de Comunicações. In the urban centres, the GSM networks of the operators TMN and Vodafone proved to have good coverage. The results derived from WCDMA, while below those of GSM, were also good. In the autonomous region of Madeira, Optimus had levels that are in line with those seen for TMN and Vodafone for both GSM and WCDMA. In the autonomous region of Azores, the results for Optimus came in below those of the other two operators studied, but were good. Meanwhile WCDMA coverage is non-existent, both for Ponta Delgada and for Angra do Heroísmo.
The main roads have long stretches with insufficient or even non-existent coverage, principally in the Azores and for WCDMA technology. For GSM, Optimus was found to have the least performance, with levels of good coverage to the order of 41% in the archipelago of the Azores and of 83.2% in the archipelago of Madeira. For WCDMA, the poorest coverage was found in the archipelago of the Azores. Optimus is not present on any island while TMN and Vodafone have no presence on the islands of Flores and Corvo. TMN and Vodafone's levels of good coverage stand at 60% and 41.7% respectively. In the archipelago of Madeira, Optimus and TMN have levels of good coverage approaching 80%, while Vodafone has 56%.
The voice service, in respect of the Service Accessibility and Call Termination Rates indicators, performs well in the urban centres, both in the archipelago of Azores and Madeira. The lowest value found was recorded for TMN for Funchal with a Call Termination Rate of 95%.
Along main roads, a general deterioration of these indicators is seen, with numerous areas with poor or inexistent mobile network radio coverage. The poorest rate is registered for Optimus in the autonomous region of the Azores with Service Accessibility under 42%.
The networks of the operators Optimus, TMN and Vodafone had good average times for establishing voice calls, irrespective of the locations analysed.
Voice calls terminated normally (120 seconds duration) have good Audio Quality, both in urban areas and along the main roads of the archipelagos of the Azores and Madeira. TMN was the better performer, although there were few significant differences between operators.
The performance of the video-telephony service remains far behind the voice service. Optimus does not provide a radio network supporting third generation services (WCDMA) in the archipelago of the Azores, making access to the video-telephony service impossible.
The performance of both the voice service and the video-telephony service was better in urban areas than along main roads. In urban areas, in the Azores, Vodafone's performance was the best, with Service Accessibility of 92.5% and a Call Termination Rate of 99.5%. In Madeira the performances of TMN and Vodafone were the best with Service Accessibility of 87% and a Call Termination Rate of nearly 99%. The Call Establishment Time indicator was also good, with the best performance registered for Vodafone.
Along main roads, very low values were registered for Service Accessibility; in the Azores they were even below 50% for all the operators studied. In the archipelago of Madeira, TMN's performance was the best with 83.2%, with values of 65.1% and 54.7% recorded respectively for Optimus and Vodafone.
The Call Termination Rate indicator was reported to be much higher than the Service Accessibility indicator. The lowest level, 89.3%, was recorded for Vodafone in the autonomous region of Madeira. As seen in urban areas, the results for the Call Establishment Time indicator were good.
Video-telephony terminated normally (120 second duration) had good Audio Quality and acceptable Video Quality. No significant differences were found between operators or between urban areas and main roads.
To carry out this study ANACOM took measurements on working days and during normal working hours between 11 June and 30 July 2007. 9,076 test calls were made and 1,259,005 radio signal measurements were taken. The sample provides for maximum margins of error, with respect to the overall results per operator, of less than 4.1% in the archipelago of the Azores and less than 5.1% in the archipelago of Madeira, with a confidence level of 95%.
Consult:
- GSM/ UMTS Mobile Networks and Services - Assessment of QoS of Voice and Video-telephony Services and Network Coverage (June/July 2007) - Azores and Madeira https://www.anacom.pt/render.jsp?contentId=678298
