2% p.a. from 1997 onwards. [3] BAH forecasts thus indicate that residential lines will rise from 1.4 million in 1987 to 2.4 million by 2007. Business lines have expanded faster than residential over the past decade. This trend will continue and the gap will widen as there is less of a ceiling to business line growth, whereas residential line sales are reaching saturation point. BAH forecasts a 7% p.a. growth falling to 6% in 1992 and to 5% p.a. from 1997 and thereafter. BAH forecasts that business lines will grow from 0.5 million in 1987 to 1.6 million by 2007.
EXHIBIT 3.7 GROWTH RATES IN RESIDENTIAL AND BUSINESS LINES
Residential lines
Business lines
1977-81
% p.a.
1981-86 % p.a.
8.0
5.6
10.6
8.3
Source: Hong Kong Telephone Company Limited, Review of Operations 1986-87
Local leased lines
There are approximately 38,000 non telex local leased lines in use in Hong Kong and almost 30,000 telex lines rented out to CWHK.
The zero charge rate encourages smaller to medium sized businesses to utilize the free voice lines whenever possible. Leased lines are required however for data transfer, for linking databases, for "hot lines" between financial dealers and brokers, for paging and cellular radio, for "tie lines" between PABXS, for data lines between computer's, as links between offices and their alarm systems and of course for local and international telex traffic calls. Their growth rates are influenced primarily by the growth of the financial, information and business sectors. Local leased lines have been growing quite slowly at 5% p.a. whereas the number of telex lines have been increasing at 10% p.a. since 1981. BAH forecasts that local leased and telex lines will expand on average at 38 p.a., with the slower growth in telex reducing the overall growth rate due to its partial replacement by facsimile.
Datel and Faxlines
There are 10,400 Datel lines in use in Hong Kong connecting PCs and an estimated 33,000 Faxlines with the latter expanding at a rate of 2,000 per month.
BAH estimates that the growth rates will begin to slow down from the current high of 40%-60% to 10% p.a. by 1997/78 and thereafter.
3*
Single Year Population Projections 1986-2007, Census and Statistics Department
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