Here is Vivacom's annual report for 2020. It includes information about the important initiatives of the company over the past year, which brought many challenges not only to the business and society in Bulgaria, but also worldwide.
Despite the serious difficulties caused by the fight against the spread of the COVID-19 epidemic, in 2020 our company managed to celebrate a number of achievements.
Vivacom has proven its leadership position not only in Bulgaria but also in Europe. Our mobile network has proven to be the fastest in Europe, scoring the highest Speed ScoreTM, based on Ookla's rigorous analysis of user-initiated Speedtest® tests. The company received the award for the first six months of 2020, after which it confirmed its success for the second half of the year.
In the same year, we launched the first 5G commercial network in our country in the central parts of all 27 regional cities, using Dynamic Spectrum Sharing Technology (DSS), which distributes the traffic between 4G and 5G according to current consumption. With the introduction of this method, our company ranks among the leading telecom operators such as Swisscom, Play, Vodafone, Verizon and AT&T, which have taken this step.
In fixed networks, the company also achieved great success - launched its 10-gigabit optical network, which offers optical Internet with speeds up to 10Gbps.
Last year, the company entered the fintech services market decisively, launching its Pay by Vivacom digital wallet. It allows contactless payments, money transfers, online and offline shopping, tracking of all transactions and digitization of loyalty cards to retail outlets.
2020 is the eighth in a row in which Vivacom ranks first in terms of total revenues on the Bulgarian telecom market. In addition to consolidating its leadership position in Bulgaria, the company has made a big step in its development towards telecom internationally. In the middle of the year, Vivacom became part of the leading telecommunications and media operator in Southeast Europe - United Group, based in the Netherlands.
Undoubtedly, for many business areas, as well as for the society as a whole, the year was marked by the fight against the spread of the COVID-19 epidemic and dealing with the severe economic and social consequences. In the conditions of mass transition to distance work and learning and more and more daily activities transferred to the online environment and with the help of technology, telecoms have proved to be a key role in the functioning of the economy and people's lives. Despite the unprecedented growth in mobile and fixed services traffic, Vivacom's networks continued to operate without serious difficulties. At peak times, there was an increase of up to 50% in some services compared to the same period in 2019. This trend of higher traffic congestion continued throughout the year. But the company managed to provide its services and assure customers` need for communication and connection with the world.
As a company with a long tradition of conducting socially responsible campaigns, in this year of trials for the whole society, we decided to focus our aid on the sector that needed it the most - healthcare. Together with United Group we made a donation of BGN 900,000 to the Ministry of Health, followed by another donation of BGN 300,000 to three hospitals in the country. We also supported the Ministry of Education in providing distance education.
We offered our customers a number of free, additional telecom services for the period of the state of emergency imposed in the country, which would facilitate them in conditions of social isolation.
Last but not least, our company quickly and efficiently took all necessary measures to protect the health of its employees, customers and partners.
See the full report integrated report 2019 integrated report 2018 integrated report 2017 integrated report 2016 sustainability report 2015 sustainability report 2014 sustainability report 2023
