Cornered! is a blog devoted, most of the time anyway, to telecommunications: local and global issues, technology, people and trends from the perspective of someone who's been reporting, analysing and commenting on the industry since the dark ages (BC - before competition). Sometimes serious, sometimes flippant, sometimes frivolous. Controversial, analytical, informative, amusing, but never boring; a vehicle for examinations of important issues and observations on my encounters and experiences in an industry where polarised views and hyperbole are the norm.
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Cornered! All options on the table in UK broadband policy review
Cornered! All options on the table in UK broadband policy review | All options on the table in UK broadband policy review |
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| by Stuart Corner | |
| Thursday, 28 February 2008 | |
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Page 2 of 2 In parallel with the review, the UK Government will also ask the Broadband Stakeholders Group (BSG) to examine the economics of fibre deployment, specifically whether deployment of fibre to the premises will be viable without a first step of deploying fibre to the cabinet. Featured Whitepaper
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The parallels between the UK and Australia are quite close. A commentary on announcement of the UK review, on the Telecom TV website, observed that "BT, the UK's incumbent telco, is the only carrier with the money and organisation to rewire the UK but it is halfway through its £10 billion programme to provide its subscribers with its 21st Century Network. Thus the operator is highly unlikely to volunteer to take on another massive project without financial help from the government and would, naturally enough given the competitive nature of the market, be unlikely in the medium- to long-term to trust Ofcom to allow it to make the rate of return necessary to justify the huge cost of such an investment to its shareholders. The main difference between the UK and Australia is that Telstra is willing to make that investent and would be prepared to trust the ACCC if the ACCC were to allow it to make the return it wants, but there is Buckley's chance of that happening. So Telstra is refusing to play ball and instead the government is proposing to shell out several billion dollars on FTTN under the current regulatory regime. Telstra enjoys considerably more market power than does BT and is less constrained by regulation, which in the UK new extends to structural separation of BT. And yet the UK does not think that its current regime will provide the right environment for investment in future broadband networks. Maybe instead of simply shelling out $4.7 billion for an FTTN network, the Australian Government should look beyond the current regulatory regime and also put all options on the table. |
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