Latin America Internet Market

I am in Argentina this week on a Consulting assignment with Mercado Libre (MELI), the region’s largest e-commerce marketplace. So here’s some interesting data about the Latin American Internet market from a bunch of different sources that I am working with. [My Indian readers would find it interesting to contrast some of this data with that of the Indian market.]

From Pacific Crest Securities:

Latin America is a very attractive e-commerce opportunity that should support several years of rapid growth. In particular, we believe that Latin America?s sizable population, increasing wealth, early-stage Internet and broadband adoption, and poor retail infrastructure should benefit and drive strong e-commerce growth.

Latin America has a population of roughly 550 million, representing 9% of the world?s population. comScore estimates that there are over 53 million Internet users over the age of 14 in Latin America, representing 13% online penetration. Brazil – ?36% of the GDP and 35% of the population in Latin America – ?is significantly underpenetrated at just 11% Internet adoption. As this market reaches critical mass, we believe that it can have a significant impact on the growth in the region.

The benefits of broadband Internet are just beginning; penetration is only around 10% of the Latin American population. For example, comScore estimates that the average broadband Internet user in Brazil spends over twice the number of hours online per month than a narrowband Internet user, as of January 2007.