مقاله سال ۲۰۱۶

Ample empirical evidence supports the idea that the diffusion of information and communications technology (ICT) services is an important driver of economic growth (Gruber, Hätönen, & Koutroumpis, 2014). For example, Czernich, Falck, Kretschmer, and Woessmann (2011), using Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development country level data compiled between 1996 and 2007, found that broadband adoption has a significant positive impact on national annual per capita growth, estimated at 0.9–۱٫۵% for every additional 10% increase in broadband penetration. Similar results have been reported in other areas, like China (Kumar, Stauvermann, & Samitas, in press) or the Small Pacific Island States (Kumar, Kumar, & Patel, 2015). Moreover, a recent survey of the literature indicates that ICT services have also had a positive significant effect on business productivity (Cardona, Kretschmer, & Strobel, 2013). Hence, ICT services play a key role in entire industries and sectors.

Traditionally, regulatory bodies assumed that large commercial customers enjoyed high bargaining power, which largely reduced the risks of abuses from dominant telecommunications operators. However, the increased competition brought about by alternative networks (cable) and by local loop unbundlers in the residential segment, together with the economic crisis, has highlighted the competitive problems faced by European enterprises, a market segment where incumbent operators still have an important stronghold, and has brought the traditional laissez-faire regulatory approach into question. Combined with the well-established notion that digital markets must play a crucial role in the economic recovery of Europe (Gruber et al., 2014), this has resulted in electronic communications regulators’ growing interest in the business segment. Several authorities have looked into the ways operators market their services to enterprises and questioned whether such offers cater adequately to their needs. National regulatory authorities (NRAs) such as the former Spanish Comisión del Mercado de las Telecomunicaciones (CMT, 2011) or the British Office of Communications (OFCOM, 2010) and private stakeholders such as WIK (Godlovitch, Monti, Schäfer, & Stumpf, 2013) have published studies that reflect on the differences between mass market and high-end users, focusing on the special needs of the latter, and emphasizing the importance of telecommunications services for national productivity. Unsurprisingly, the 2014 Explanatory Note of the European Commission (EC) Recommendation on Relevant Markets has for the first time distinguished the mass retail market from the high-quality retail market, also acknowledging differences in the related wholesale markets and, in this way, has opened the door to NRAs considering business and residential customers separately (European Commission, 2014).

Given these trends, an empirical study was conducted to identify the main drivers of satisfaction with mobile and fixed internet services in Spain for micro-enterprises, small and medium enterprises (SMEs), and large firms. When possible, the results were compared with the drivers of satisfaction for residential consumers to identify distinct competition and market conditions in each segment. The results can provide policy makers and telecom managers with insight into the business market. This is the first study that deals with data on the drivers of business clients’ satisfaction for both mobile and internet services. Gijón, Garín-Muñoz, Pérez-Amaral, and López-Zorzano (2013) published a study based on survey data from 2009 on the drivers of Spanish residential consumers’ satisfaction with cell phone services. The present paper is based on a survey of business consumers carried out between 2010 and 2011 and deals with both mobile and fixed internet services. Therefore, some of the drivers of consumer satisfaction in the present study are firm-related.