The past month has seen Eircom issue a statement that broadband prices will be cut by up to 25% from October; subscribers to Eircom’s Home Starter broadband package can expect to save €5 a month and those on the Home Plus package will be €10 a month better off.
But many in the telecommunications industry and most Irish consumers will hope this announcement is just the tip of the iceberg and that Eircom’s new owners, Babcock & Brown, will open up the market and facilitate more choice for the end user.
Broadband subscriptions grew in the first quarter of this year by 19%, with a third of this growth being in broadband take up from cable customers. But the latest ECTA Broadband report shows Ireland still sitting precariously close to the bottom of the EU15 league table exhibiting the second lowest figures in broadband penetration.
Better do better than that
Tom Hickey, chairman of the alternative operators group in Ireland, Alto, says for DSL availability, Ireland is around the OECD average but in context this is not good enough as this average includes figures from less developed countries like Turkey and Mexico.
He says for Ireland to get in line with the EU average, broadband take-up would have to double and to do that there needs to be healthier competition and more consumer choice.
“Ireland’s position, relative to the E15 countries is really very poor. This country, with its population profile and economic status is relatively well off. Something is not working, when you track Ireland’s progress we are not even catching up and we should be one of the leaders.”
He says to increase the spread of broadband in Ireland, the unbundling process needs to be allowed to progress quickly and competition among providers needs to be raised.
“Across the EU the countries with highest penetration are those where there are plenty of providers – broadband growth is directly tied to effective competition.”
He says not all blame can be attributed to Eircom’s investment and roll out to date and that complete and successful broadband rollout would probably require some government incentive or intervention.
Several broadband operators are progressing with unbundling (LLU) but are yet to iron out a process that will allow them to sell services to the mass market.
LLU would take sole ownership of the data part of the lines way from Eircom with Eircom still retaining the voice part. BT Ireland has managed to unbundle 45 exchanges but can offer LLU at this stage only to customers in the business community, says BT Ireland’s consumer product director Peter Evans.
“LLU unbundling is at this stage not robust enough to sell on yet as it will not handle volume orders. This is partly because number portability is still manual so very laborious but we are working with the ComReg now, a new roadmap has been agreed and we are cautiously optimistic.”
Evans says the three main benefits of LLU are that it will open up competitiveness in price and service levels; innovation, the ability to deliver new products such as TV over broadband and that LLU will give ownership of the network to ISPs.
He says aside from automated number portability the issue of migration needs to be addressed so customers on wholesale products are able to move to other providers and the Service Level Agreement at LLU is also very poor and needs to be revisited.
“The new owners at Eircom are saying the right things and we are optimistic but we have been here before. It is time, well past time in fact. I have been working on LLU for five years and it is time the new owners stand up to their promises.”
Convergence of services
BT Ireland recently launched a Broadband and Total Talk combined offer; for €45 a month customers get broadband (1Mbit/sec) and all landline calls to local, national and UK destinations.
BT claims it is signing up 15,000 customers a week to the new “All In” deal, which, Evans says, is available to around 1 million homes in Ireland.
He says the deal was developed because of consumer demand for convenience packages, several benefits under one bill, to counteract the negatives of Ireland having such high line rental charges.
The Broadband and Total Talk offer relies on the wholesale bit stream product from Eircom so customers will be able to keep the same number, and is aimed at BT encouraging a good core of customers so when the LLU process is right and agreed in the market place consumers are already with a provider who is able to offer good products and better prices, a high level of service and better product differentiation, Evans says.
Multi-service offerings
The trend in telecommunications offerings, apparently driven by consumer demand is this type of multi use, multi service offering, billed from one company in one move. Magnet Entertainment has offered triple play services since 2004 and consumers are now even lapping up tailored communications packages offering specific television channels and phone deals such as the service Magnet offers to Ireland’s Polish community.
Magnet’s triple play, built on ADSL2+ technology, has been made available to more than 500,000 households, making the company a serious player in the triple play space, director of communications, Charlie Ardagh says.
Magnet provides contention free broadband so the connection will remain at optimum speed even at peak times because you are not sharing the connection with anyone, he says.
Cable providers make a strong push
UPC Ireland, parent company of NTL and Chorus announced the launch of a trial of its triple play offering, labeled Digital Telephony, in July. Initially available only to customers in Adamstown, Lucan, Co Dublin, and further roll out to Galway and Waterford is expected.
With delivery of broadband, television and VoIP internet telephony through existing cable infrastructure, triple-play is being talked up as future of home communications with consumers preferring to pay one provider for these previously disparate services.
UPC claims huge success with triple play services in other countries in Europe and with more than 280,000 homes broadband enabled through NTL or Chorus as of Q2 2006, there is certainly room for growth.
In 2003 UPC had 25,000 broadband subscribers but now it boasts some 40,000 subscribers.
UPC offers a 6Mbit/sec package for €39.99 which is very reasonable when compared to similar packages from other providers.
Imagine that
For would-be first time broadband subscribers, Imagine advertise a broadband package for just an initial €9.99 sign up fee and a monthly router rental. The Imagine Broadband offer provides up to 20hours of broadband access for no additional charge, but if you go over the 20hour limit that you pay 4c per minute.
Wondering about wireless?
Although DSL is still the dominant technology in Ireland, wireless broadband services are giving consumers some badly needed choice when it comes to broadband delivery. Wireless operators are beginning to make headway on the Irish telecommunications landscape with several building momentum in recent months and announcing or on the verge of revealing promisingly substantial roll out plans.
Digiweb for example holds around 6% of the overall Irish broadband market and with a huge expansion of the Digiweb Metro service following a €20m injection in funds look set to become more widely subscribed to.
The Metro service, actually a cable modem service adopted for use with wireless technology, is already available to customers within 10km of Digiweb’s base stations in Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Galway, Waterford, Drogheda, Carlow and Portlaoise and will soon open up in 20 further locations.
Head of strategic development, John Quinn, boasts that at less than €20 a month for broadband and phone connection Digiweb is the most cost effective operator for these services in Ireland.
Digiweb is able to supply consumers with DSL, from every DSL enabled exchange in the country, Wireless satellite, fibre and soon to be available mobile services and from the perspective of service rollout this gives them an edge. Quinn says using a combination of these technologies allows Digiweb to tailor solutions to the needs of customers throughout the country.
Ripwave roars into town
Wireless provider, Irish Broadband has a plug and play, broadband in a box Ripwave modem product to connect directly to a customers PC via and Ethernet connection for €18.95 a month. With a 512Kbit/sec download speed this entry level broadband product allows unlimited access to the Web wirelessly for anyone in one of many Irish towns in Irish Broadband’s coverage area (check the website www.irishbroadband.ie for details.)
For €35.99 a month Irish Broadband offer a Breeze 1Mbit/sec product with even 1Mbit/sec upload and download speeds and free connection.
MD of wireless provider Ice Broadband, Yvonne Rooney says the key that wireless services hold to the broadband rollout is the ability to identify an area not served by DSL services, get in there with a wireless base station and start delivering services – everything set up and ready to go in a matter of weeks, she says.
Ice cold and wire-free
Ice Broadband is currently available to towns in Dublin, Kildare and Meath and to receive the fibre 5.8 wireless signal you must be within 7-10km of a base station. Ice has big plans for further rollout in the next six months, details of which are still under wraps.
‘Demand is so high, it’s unbelievable to think there are so many businesses in Irish towns crying out to get online for things as simple as checking email and not having broadband services available to them. Wireless is a quick solution and Ice Broadband has large rollout plans.”
The benefits in subscribing to wireless broadband is the technologies ability to offer equal upload and download speeds, Ice’s 2Mbit/sec package for example allows symmetric 2Mbit/sec download and upload speeds where some DSL services are unable to do this. Wireless also provides a non degradated broadband supply as it’s not reliant on quality of copper lines, with Ice Broadband offering three flat rate packages starting at €37.99.
Broadband utopia
Whether you go for a wireless or wired option, it is clear that ubiquitous broadband access must be the target for the country and it must be achieved soon or the next stage of our economic growth could be severely affected if we continue to fall behind our western European neighbours in the broadband availability, speed and price stakes. Business opportunities aside, without an adequate broadband infrastructure, Irish home users will be denied access to the new wave of video on demand and IPTV services that are coming down the line. Ultimately, it rests with the regulator to accelerate the local loop unbundling process and foster the growth of true competition that will allow the broadband utopia to become a reality.
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