Never mind the quality, feel the speed.

In his recent rather self-congratulatory speech, Jeremy Hunt borrowed some of Team GB’s Olympic success to freshen up the performance of his department’s broadband development plans.  As others have pointed out, he didn’t actually have a lot to say that was new: he basically defended the pursuit of broadband speeds as a prerequisite for the country having the ‘best network in Europe’ and cited some helpful statistics on the UK’s relative performance – ignoring some less flattering metrics.  He also hit back at the other recent criticisms of government strategy by the House of Lords Communications Committee, in particular their alleged misconception that ‘fibre to the cabinet is the sum of the government’s ambitions’ for the broadband network. 

On the question of speed, Hunt is right to point out the folly of setting an arbitrary target that is deemed to be ‘enough’ to meet broadband demands: the latter are always likely to exceed current expectations.  However, he still fails to address the HoL’s legitimate concern over universality.  As the Select Committee put it: “what is important is the long term assurance that as new internet applications emerge, everyone will be able to benefit, from inhabitants of inner cities to the remotest areas of the UK.” 

The ‘misunderstanding’ over FTTC is perhaps more worrying.  Hunt seems to justify the choice of this technology as if it were a matter of government planning, whereas the choice is entirely a matter for BT. Similarly, the idea that FTTC “is most likely to be a temporary stepping stone to fibre to the home” and that “by 2016 fibre to the home will be available on demand to over two thirds of the population” are again matters that are both entirely dependent on BT’s commercial judgement.  (On current expectations, BT’s pricing of ‘FTTP on demand’ is likely to make it too expensive for the residential market).  

Hunt also fails to acknowledge the HoL’s deeper concern with FTTC – and the PON network that BT is also rolling out – that this architecture is unsuitable for physical unbundling, thus stifling the prospects for service competition.  The Committee’s fear is therefore that current broadband investments, including government subsidies, will allow BT to recreate in fibre the monopoly it gradually lost in its copper network.  But hey, monopoly or not, it’ll be fast..!!

 

 

Behold the meaning of everything

Recently returned from holiday, I was eager to take a look at the findings from the inquiry by the House of Lords Select Committee on superfast broadband.  The report's 67 pages contain a lot of material for discussion but here’s a first, rather sweeping impression…

Douglas Adams wrote that the answer to the meaning of life, the universe, and everything was 42.  In similar gnomic fashion, the members of the ‘Lords Communications Committee appear to have concluded that, in the realm of broadband, the answer is either ‘dark fibre’ or ‘middle mile’ or possibly both.  If you listen to much of the oral evidence from the ‘Lords Inquiry (and I have), it’s striking how often the peers shoe-horned these two concepts into the discussion – even where they weren’t entirely relevant.  Indeed, members of the Committee admitted that they weren’t altogether sure about the meaning of the two terms or why they might be of such significance issues but it was as if an ancient sage had whispered to them mysteriously that the concepts would somehow unlock the solution to delivering the best broadband network in Europe.  As a result, the Committee’s ‘alternative vision’ for a broadband strategy has been fashioned around the twin pillars of wholesale access to dark fibre and the provision of backhaul.  While there’s undoubtedly merit in exploring both issues, their dominance in the construction has perhaps been at the expense of other, more mundane considerations – for example, the role of wireless in rural areas and the affordability of a fibre-only solution.  That’s soothsayers for you!