Telecommunications

}
}}
|-
!style="background:#f0f0f0;" align="left" valign="top"| Telephone land lines
|style="background:#f0f0f0;" valign="top"| 19.8 million (2006)
|-
!align="left" valign="top"|Mobile lines
|valign="top"| 57 million (2006)
|-
!style="background:#f0f0f0;" align="left" valign="top"|Telephone country code
|style="background:#f0f0f0;" valign="top"| + 52
|-
!align="left" valign="top"|Internet Users
|valign="top"| 22.7 million (2007)
|-
!style="background:#f0f0f0;" align="left" valign="top"|Internet country code
|style="background:#f0f0f0;" valign="top"| .mx
|-
| align="center" bgcolor="lightblue" colspan="2"|
|}

Communications in Mexico are regulated by the Secretariat of Communication and Transportation (Secretaría de Comunicaciones y Transportes or SCT), a federal

Federation

A federation , also known as a federal state, is a type of sovereign state characterized by a union of partially self-governing states or regions united by a central government...

 executive

Executive Power

Executive Power is Vince Flynn's fifth novel, and the fourth to feature Mitch Rapp, an American agent that works for the CIA as an operative for a covert counter terrorism unit called the "Orion Team."-Plot summary:...

 cabinet

Cabinet (government)

A Cabinet is a body of high ranking government officials, typically representing the executive branch. It can also sometimes be referred to as the Council of Ministers, an Executive Council, or an Executive Committee.- Overview :...

 ministry and by the Federal Telecommunications Commission (Comisión Federal de Telecomunicaciones [Federal Telecommunications Commission] or COFETEL).

Mexico

Mexico

The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...

's communication services market is among the largest in Latin America

Latin America

Latin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages  – particularly Spanish and Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken. Latin America has an area of approximately 21,069,500 km² , almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface or 14.1% of its land surface area...

, liberalized in the 1990s, with the landmark privatization of Teléfonos de México (Telmex) a previously state-owned monopoly. Since then, new operators have entered the market, but Telmex still remains the dominant player.

Regulation

Founded on May 13, 1891, as the Secretariat of Communications and Public Works, the SCT is divided into three subsecretariats: the Subsecretariat of Infrastructure, the Subsecretariat of Communications and the Subsecretariat of Transportation.

Radio and television

See also List of Mexican television networks and List of television stations in Mexico

Usage of radio, television and Internet in Mexico nowadays is prevalent. The first television transmission in Mexico was conducted by Javier Stavoli in 1931. Guillermo González Camarena

Guillermo González Camarena

Guillermo González Camarena , was a Mexican engineer who was the inventor of a color-wheel type of color television, and who also introduced color television to Mexico....

 built his own monochromatic camera in 1934, and in 1940 he developed the first trichromatic system and obtained the first patent for color television in the world. After developing radio and television stations, in 1948, he built the studio Gon-Cam, which was considered the best television system in the world in the time, according to survey conducted by the Columbia College of Chicago. With the passage of the century, the television broadcasting market became dominated by two powerful companies, Televisa—the largest Spanish media company in the Spanish-speaking world — and Azteca

Azteca (television)

Azteca, is the second largest Mexican television entertainment. It was established in 1983 as the state-owned Instituto Mexicano de la Televisión , a holding of the national TV networks channel 13 and 7 and was privatized under its current name in 1993 and now is part of Grupo Salinas...

, even though several dozen regional networks operate in the country. In 2006 there were approximately 1410 radio broadcast stations, and 236 television stations (excluding repeaters), plus 906 complementary stations.

Telephony and Internet

In general, the telecommunications industry is mostly dominated by Telmex

Telmex

Telmex is a telecommunications company headquartered in Mexico City that provides telecommunication products and services in Mexico, Argentina, Colombia, Brazil and other countries in Latin America. In addition to traditional fixed-line telephone service, Telmex also offers Internet access, data,...

 (Teléfonos de México), privatized in 1990. Telmex has diversified its operations by incorporating Internet

Internet

The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...

 service and mobile telephony

Mobile telephony

Mobile telephony is the provision of telephone services to phones which may move around freely rather than stay fixed in one location. Mobile phones connect to a terrestrial cellular network of base stations , whereas satellite phones connect to orbiting satellites...

. It has also expanded its operations to Colombia

Colombia

Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia , is a unitary constitutional republic comprising thirty-two departments. The country is located in northwestern South America, bordered to the east by Venezuela and Brazil; to the south by Ecuador and Peru; to the north by the Caribbean Sea; to the...

, Peru

Peru

Peru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean....

, Chile

Chile

Chile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far...

, Argentina

Argentina

Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

, Brazil

Brazil

Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...

, Uruguay

Uruguay

Uruguay ,officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay,sometimes the Eastern Republic of Uruguay; ) is a country in the southeastern part of South America. It is home to some 3.5 million people, of whom 1.8 million live in the capital Montevideo and its metropolitan area...

, Ecuador

Ecuador

Ecuador , officially the Republic of Ecuador is a representative democratic republic in South America, bordered by Colombia on the north, Peru on the east and south, and by the Pacific Ocean to the west. It is one of only two countries in South America, along with Chile, that do not have a border...

 and the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

. Due Mexican diverse orography

Orography

Orography is the study of the formation and relief of mountains, and can more broadly include hills, and any part of a region's elevated terrain...

—the country is crossed by two high altitude mountain ranges extending from the Rocky Mountains

Rocky Mountains

The Rocky Mountains are a major mountain range in western North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch more than from the northernmost part of British Columbia, in western Canada, to New Mexico, in the southwestern United States...

—providing landline telephone service at remote mountainous areas is expensive, and penetration of line-phones per capita is low compared to other Latin America

Latin America

Latin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages  – particularly Spanish and Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken. Latin America has an area of approximately 21,069,500 km² , almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface or 14.1% of its land surface area...

n countries, with 20 million lines. Mobile telephony has the advantage of reaching all areas at a lower cost, due to reduced investments in required infrastructure, and the total number of mobile lines in Mexico is four times that of landlines, with an estimated 83 million lines. The telecommunications industry is regulated by the government through Cofetel (Comisión Federal de Telecomunicaciones).

In April 2009, the ITESM (Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey) reported 25,217,500 users; 78% of personal computer Internet access is broadband

Broadband

The term broadband refers to a telecommunications signal or device of greater bandwidth, in some sense, than another standard or usual signal or device . Different criteria for "broad" have been applied in different contexts and at different times...

 access. There are approximately 7.6 million internet hosts in Mexico, ranking eight in the world.

Satellite communications

The satellite system is domestic with 120 earth stations. There is also extensive microwave radio relay network and considerable use of fiber-optic and coaxial cable.

Mexican satellites are operated by Satélites Mexicanos (Satmex), a private company, leader in Latin America and servicing both North and South America. It offers broadcast, telephone and telecommunication services to 37 countries in the Americas

Americas

The Americas, or America , are lands in the Western hemisphere, also known as the New World. In English, the plural form the Americas is often used to refer to the landmasses of North America and South America with their associated islands and regions, while the singular form America is primarily...

, from Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

 to Argentina

Argentina

Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

. Through business partnerships Satmex provides high-speed connectivity to ISPs and Digital Broadcast Services. The system is currently composed of three main satellites: Solidaridad 2, Satmex 5 and Satmex 6 of the world.