Google to invest in Brazil while broadband usage climbs
Date added: 27th April, 2011 at 15:26
(view all articles from April, 2011)
Categories: Economy
Google is to make an investment in Brazil at a time when broadband usage in the country is on the up.
In an interview with the Financial Times, head of the company's Brazilian subsidiary Fabio Coelho said the firm intends to increase its headcount having seen good returns in the country.
"Last year we grew 80 per cent in Brazil in terms of revenue and we expect to grow at the same pace this year," he explained.
The company's success may be down to the rising number of people with access to the internet in Latin America's largest economy.
A recent report from Brazil's Associacao Brasileira de Telecomunicacoes (Telebrasil) stated that people are increasingly connecting to both fixed and mobile broadband services in the country.
The number of accesses for fixed broadband jumped 20.5 per cent in the 12 months leading to the end of March, reaching at total of 14 million, with the amenity available in 5,000 municipalities across the nation.
Meanwhile, mobile broadband grew by 77.7 per cent in the same period, with 24.4 million people connecting to the service across 1,441 municipalities.
Altogether, there was a 51.5 per cent yearly increase in fixed and mobile broadband connections by the end of March, with the total reaching 38.5 million.
The Financial Times noted that this jump in the number of people accessing the web is due to social mobility, with Brazilians moving into the middle classes and purchasing computers.
Furthermore, getting more individuals online is an aim for the nation's president Dilma Rousseff, with the country's communication minister Paulo Bernardo recently announcing that the government could pour as much as R$1 billion into internet services each year until 2014.
The leadership believes that higher connection speeds and a greater number of accesses has the potential to spur social and economic growth.
"Brazil is a beautiful opportunity for the digital world," Mr Coelho told the Financial Times. "There is a big ecosystem to be developed here."
The expert explained that the country "has a very low broadband penetration", with a maximum of 14 million smart phones among the 200 million or more mobile devices in the country.
However, the country made up two to three per cent of Google's revenue last year and the company is keen to invest in Brazil.
Mr Coelho stated that the firm plans to employ around 50 per cent more people in the next 12 months, saying he is optimistic about the success of social networking site Orkut, mobile platform Android and YouTube advertising in the nation.
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