This small market of just under 3 million inhabitants has a competitive mobile market with a high mobile-cellular penetration rate. Fixed services are less commonplace in Albania and fixed-broadband is scarcely available, especially in rural areas of the country.

Albania’s ICT ecosystem has seen a positive development over the past decade. Innovation strategies brought forward by the Government and the European Union enlargement process have fostered policy reform, in particular in the ICT sector (European Commission, 2014). Access to and use of ICTs have grown due to the Government’s strategic vision and liberalization of the ICT market. While ICT infrastructure is well developed in urban centres, rural connectivity remains a challenge. In some regions, especially rural ones, costs can be high and penetration low. The lack of rural connectivity is “one of the major gaps” and hampers growth in the country (ITU, 2016).