ANTEL ( es, Administración Nacional de Telecomunicaciones, lit=National Administration of Telecommunications) is

Uruguay Uruguay (; ), officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay ( es, República Oriental del Uruguay), is a country in South America. It shares borders with Argentina to its west and southwest and Brazil to its north and northeast; while bordering ...

government-owned State ownership, also called government ownership and public ownership, is the ownership of an industry, asset, or enterprise by the state or a public body representing a community, as opposed to an individual or private party. Public ownership ...

telecommunications company A telephone company, also known as a telco, telephone service provider, or telecommunications operator, is a kind of communications service provider (CSP), more precisely a telecommunications service provider (TSP), that provides telecommunicat ...

, founded in 1974 as a separate legal entity after spinning off the telecommunications division of UTE, which had the monopoly of landline telephony since 1931. The company has a

monopoly A monopoly (from Greek language, Greek el, μόνος, mónos, single, alone, label=none and el, πωλεῖν, pōleîn, to sell, label=none), as described by Irving Fisher, is a market with the "absence of competition", creating a situati ...

landline A landline (land line, land-line, main line, home phone, fixed-line, and wireline) is a telephone connection that uses metal wires or optical fiber telephone line for transmission, as distinguished from a mobile cellular network, which us ...

telephony Telephony ( ) is the field of technology involving the development, application, and deployment of telecommunication services for the purpose of electronic transmission of voice, fax, or data, between distant parties. The history of telephony is i ...

and data services in the country. They also provide mobile phone services (in direct competition with Claro and

Movistar Movistar () is a major telecommunications provider owned by Telefónica, operating in Spain and Hispanic American countries. It is the largest provider of landline, broadband, mobile services, and pay television ( Movistar+) in Spain. Movistar ...

) and

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, p ...

-related services, being the only provider of ADSL and land-line data services because of the monopoly situation.

History

In 1992, under the presidency of

Luis Alberto Lacalle Luis Alberto Lacalle de Herrera, GCMG (; ''Lacalle'' locally or ; born 13 July 1941), is a Uruguayan politician and lawyer who served as President of Uruguay from 1990 to 1995. Background His mother, María Hortensia de Herrera de Lacalle, ...

, a privatization of all government-owned companies was attempted. However, a later

referendum A referendum (plural: referendums or less commonly referenda) is a Direct democracy, direct vote by the Constituency, electorate on a proposal, law, or political issue. This is in contrast to an issue being voted on by a Representative democr ...

revoked the privatizations law, being

Pluna PLUNA Líneas Aéreas Uruguayas S.A. was the flag carrier of Uruguay. It was headquartered in Carrasco, Montevideo and operated scheduled services within South America, as well as scheduled cargo and charter services from its hub at Carrasco I ...

the only company to be successfully privatized to

Varig VARIG (acronym for Viação Aérea RIo-Grandense, ''Rio Grandean Airways'') was the first airline founded in Brazil, in 1927. From 1965 until 1990, it was Brazil's leading airline, and virtually its only international one. In 2005, Varig went ...

. Antel enjoys a monopoly on land lines in Uruguay. As of 2008 ANTEL's monopoly status also forbids cable operators even in larger cities, such as Montevideo, to provide data services (Internet) or voice services along with their cable service. Antel started deploying

fiber to the home Fiber to the ''x'' (FTTX; also spelled "fibre") or fiber in the loop is a generic term for any broadband network architecture using optical fiber to provide all or part of the local loop used for last mile telecommunications. As fiber optic ...

Montevideo Montevideo () is the capital and largest city of Uruguay. According to the 2011 census, the city proper has a population of 1,319,108 (about one-third of the country's total population) in an area of . Montevideo is situated on the southern co ...

in 2012, aiming to switch 240,000 clients that year with a cost of US$180 million. Previous DSL subscribers keep their contract, or may switch to faster Internet Vera plans: 150/12 Mbit/s for US$72/month, 120/12 Mbit/s for $61/month, 60/10 Mbit/s for $49/month, or 30/4 Mbit/s for $32/month, throttled back to 10% of those speeds after a 700 / 350 / 400 / 150 GB cap. IP television, voice over IP and connections in the department capitals are expected for 2013 and 2014.

Telecommunications tower

ANTEL owns Uruguay's tallest

skyscraper A skyscraper is a tall continuously habitable building having multiple floors. Modern sources currently define skyscrapers as being at least or in height, though there is no universally accepted definition. Skyscrapers are very tall high-ri ...

, the Telecommunications Tower, which has 160 meters and 35 floors. It is the tallest building in the country. It was designed by

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

Carlos Ott Carlos Ott (born October 16, 1946, in Montevideo) is a Uruguayan architect who resides in Canada and many other countries. He became famous when he won his first prize in 1983 (among 744 architects from all over the world) for the construction ...

. It is situated by the side of

bay A bay is a recessed, coastal body of water that directly connects to a larger main body of water, such as an ocean, a lake, or another bay. A large bay is usually called a gulf, sea, sound, or bight. A cove is a small, circular bay with a na ...

Satellite telecommunications

Uruguay installed its first satellite earth station in 1985 followed by two

Intelsat Intelsat S.A. (formerly INTEL-SAT, INTELSAT, Intelsat) is a multinational satellite services provider with corporate headquarters in Luxembourg and administrative headquarters in Tysons Corner, Virginia, United States. Originally formed as I ...

earth stations in 1990. ANTEL, the

Aeronautics and Space Research and Diffusion Center Aeronautics is the science or art involved with the study, design, and manufacturing of air flight–capable machines, and the techniques of operating aircraft and rockets within the atmosphere. The British Royal Aeronautical Society identifies ...

and the UdelaR launched the first national satellite for

telecommunications Telecommunication is the transmission of information by various types of technologies over wire, radio, optical, or other electromagnetic systems. It has its origin in the desire of humans for communication over a distance greater than that ...

in June 2014, the Antelsat.

Private competition

Antel has been granted monopoly power over most forms of communication carriage in Uruguay, except for wireless voice (mobile only), wireless internet service, wireless broadcast TV and cable TV. In early August 2016 the Uruguayan supreme court issued a ruling in favor of cable TV company Monte Cablevideo S.A., declaring unconstitutional the law that made it unlawful for cable TV companies to offer Internet service. If this stood, it would represent an historic opening of the hitherto rigidly controlled Uruguayan wired Internet market, a sort of fall of the

Berlin Wall The Berlin Wall (german: Berliner Mauer, ) was a guarded concrete barrier that encircled West Berlin from 1961 to 1989, separating it from East Berlin and East Germany (GDR). Construction of the Berlin Wall was commenced by the gover ...

in Uruguayan telecom. It would mean that for the first time in Uruguayan history consumers would have a choice of providers when ordering wired Internet service. It would also mean that Uruguay would join the almost unanimous majority of nations in the Americas where cable-delivered Internet is on the menu of Internet access choices (Cuba would be the only remaining holdout.) At the end of August 2016 the supreme court issued a second similar ruling on the same matter, this time authorizing a different cable company - Nuevo Siglo - to provide the services in question (the Uruguayan legal system does not make the ruling in favor of a company apply to all other companies in that situation.) Nevertheless, for almost 7 years after those supreme court rulings cable TV companies continued to be precluded by the government from offering Internet services in Uruguay. But in June 2022 the government of

Luis Lacalle Pou Luis Alberto Aparicio Alejandro Lacalle Pou (; ''Luis Lacalle'' locally or ; born 10 August 1973) is a Uruguayan politician and lawyer serving as President of Uruguay since 1 March 2020. Son of former president Luis Alberto Lacalle, Lacalle P ...

announced it would authorize selected cable companies to start providing Internet service, a historical reversal which would effectively bust Antel's erstwhile monopoly on wired Internet services. For information on specific competitors to Antel in the services where competition is allowed, see

Telecommunications in Uruguay Telecommunications in Uruguay includes radio, television, telephones, and the Internet. Radio and television Uruguay has a mixture of privately owned and state-run broadcast media; more than 100 commercial radio stations and about 20 TV chann ...

Financial Performance

(All US$ figures for FY2011 performance were calculated using 12/31/11 exchange rate of 1 dollar = 19.903 Uruguayan pesos.) For the fiscal year ending Dec 31, 2011, Antel had revenues of US$899,361,905 (17,897,790,000 Uruguayan pesos). This represents 2% of Uruguay's 2011 GDP, putting Antel in the exclusive league of Uruguayan mega-corporations, with a share of the economy slightly higher than that of Chevron in the US. Calculated on a per-capita basis, in 2011 Antel collected US$267 of revenue per inhabitant of Uruguay (for comparison purposes the minimum monthly wage of Uruguay as of 2011 was US$300) In FY 2011 Antel had net profit of US$155,630,000 (3,097,523,000 Uruguayan pesos), or 17.3% of revenues.

Controversies

Antel has been involved in high profile and somewhat controversial investments , notably a) the purchase of the

Telecommunications Tower (Montevideo) Torre de las Telecomunicaciones ''(Telecommunications Tower)'' or Torre Joaquín Torres García ''( Joaquín Torres García Tower)'', usually referred as ''Antel Tower'', is a 157 meter tall building with 35 floors located in Montevideo, Urugua ...

, the most expensive corporate headquarters in Uruguay for US$102,000,000 and b) more recently (April 2013) the announcement of a planned investment of US$40,000,000 in a sports arena. In 2020, the LGBT film festival Llamale H sued Antel because the company didn't allow the storage of the festival contents, alleging that they don't fit the values of the company. The LGBT collective denounced discriminatory behavior by Antel.

References

External links

ANTEL
*https://iie.fing.edu.uy/investigacion/grupos/lai/ {{DEFAULTSORT:Antel Telecommunications companies of Uruguay Government-owned companies of Uruguay Economy of Montevideo Companies based in Montevideo Uruguayan brands