Fibre internet - competition going forward
Discussion
I'm sure this is the same in other parts of the country. Last year, an unknown internet provider decided to start a fibre to the home roll-out in the down and they've since started to expand that roll-out to the whole of the county. We live in a town where we have no overhead cables, so they're laying their own cables in OpenReach ducts, and where it's not possible to get fibre to the home underground, they're installing telephone poles which have caused a whole host of issues as residents don't want these poles putting up, citing that it's a new time and everything is meant to be below ground. My argument to that is that if everything was meant to be below ground, then cables to homes would have been laid in ducts rather than being directly buried. To get cables underground to some homes in the area, they're going to have to pull up gardens, driveways and so on. I signed up a year ago, and I'm still waiting and have been told installation could take years while they sort out trying to get around my neighbours objecting to having posts installed on the estate. It's an old council estate, to me, some posts are the least of the estates worries.
Anyway, I'm digressing. What I'm wondering is, long term what's going to happen in similar areas where there's going to be absolutely NO fibre competition as these cables belong to the company doing the rollout. I understand that the ISP and the company doing the infrastructure rollout are separate companies but ran by the same people. Are there provisions in place to force these infrastructure providers to open up their infrastructure to other ISPs in the future? or do we think these small companies will get swallowed up by OpenReach at some point in the future?
Anyway, I'm digressing. What I'm wondering is, long term what's going to happen in similar areas where there's going to be absolutely NO fibre competition as these cables belong to the company doing the rollout. I understand that the ISP and the company doing the infrastructure rollout are separate companies but ran by the same people. Are there provisions in place to force these infrastructure providers to open up their infrastructure to other ISPs in the future? or do we think these small companies will get swallowed up by OpenReach at some point in the future?
If they force the ISPs to share the connection, it will be at a charge. And the provider will naturally point to the investment they made, so the end charge to the customer may be not too different.
They may also argue that Internet via the satellites counts as competition, along with mobile providers 4g and 5g offerings.
If Openreach are not bothering with you as not enough money in it and the community won't pay up themselves, perhaps just be grateful someone else bothered
They may also argue that Internet via the satellites counts as competition, along with mobile providers 4g and 5g offerings.
If Openreach are not bothering with you as not enough money in it and the community won't pay up themselves, perhaps just be grateful someone else bothered
Telephone poles are not pretty, we have them and it would be nice to get rid.
In the end the cost of installation will make providing the service uneconomic, there is little profit in BB supply, it's a race to the bottom, competition has forced down prices and profits.
Wireless is the future, will make most domestic wired services redundant, no point in spending £M on running fibre if it is redundant in a few years.
In the end the cost of installation will make providing the service uneconomic, there is little profit in BB supply, it's a race to the bottom, competition has forced down prices and profits.
Wireless is the future, will make most domestic wired services redundant, no point in spending £M on running fibre if it is redundant in a few years.
It's all a bit wild west and doesn't make a great deal of sense to me. Competition to Openreach is a good thing, but the reality is an oligopoly on infrastructure - 2 or 3 large players subject to Ofcom regulation on pricing - with ISP's reselling services over the top of open access networks would give the best outcome for consumers.
Owning infrastructure in the ground for others to provide service over is notoriously difficult to make money from.
The big players like CityFibre I get - PE money, build a large network quickly with a view to ultimately flog it off to a telco other than BT as a turnkey solution to provide ISP services using their own infrastructure. I can see that would be an attractive acquisition to the big players like Sky, TalkTalk, Vodafone etc.
You've got the likes of B4RN who are not for profit and do a lot of dig over farmers fields using volunteer labour - I get that too for those areas that will never be commercially viable.
I don't get these bit part players who are building networks as cheap as possible with relatively tiny pockets of coverage. I can't see anyone wanting to acquire these networks - they often appear to be poorly built and will provide ongoing maintenance headaches. The only way this stacks up is to sell as many connections as you can and contend the hell out of the backhaul circuits. Being a consumer ISP is not particularly profitable - net profit is pennies a month per connection and it only really stacks up when you've got millions of customers. If you own your own infrastructure and amortise it over 30 years on paper it might look like a reasonable proposition, but I suspect the cost of operating a shonky infrastructure will be higher than their estimates.
Owning infrastructure in the ground for others to provide service over is notoriously difficult to make money from.
The big players like CityFibre I get - PE money, build a large network quickly with a view to ultimately flog it off to a telco other than BT as a turnkey solution to provide ISP services using their own infrastructure. I can see that would be an attractive acquisition to the big players like Sky, TalkTalk, Vodafone etc.
You've got the likes of B4RN who are not for profit and do a lot of dig over farmers fields using volunteer labour - I get that too for those areas that will never be commercially viable.
I don't get these bit part players who are building networks as cheap as possible with relatively tiny pockets of coverage. I can't see anyone wanting to acquire these networks - they often appear to be poorly built and will provide ongoing maintenance headaches. The only way this stacks up is to sell as many connections as you can and contend the hell out of the backhaul circuits. Being a consumer ISP is not particularly profitable - net profit is pennies a month per connection and it only really stacks up when you've got millions of customers. If you own your own infrastructure and amortise it over 30 years on paper it might look like a reasonable proposition, but I suspect the cost of operating a shonky infrastructure will be higher than their estimates.
hyphen said:
If they force the ISPs to share the connection, it will be at a charge. And the provider will naturally point to the investment they made, so the end charge to the customer may be not too different.
They may also argue that Internet via the satellites counts as competition, along with mobile providers 4g and 5g offerings.
If Openreach are not bothering with you as not enough money in it and the community won't pay up themselves, perhaps just be grateful someone else bothered
I'm grateful, and I understand how lucky we are to be able to get speeds of up to 10,000Mbps. It's neighbours and other people in the area complaining about the poles rather than me. I'd be happy for them to stick a pole on our drive if there was space for it. We're in a position now where maybe 50-70% of the local town have fibre to the home, and the rest of us don't because of these damn poles and people complaining about them. I know the ISP are having the same issue in other parts of the county, with residents in uproar because of the installation of telephone poles.They may also argue that Internet via the satellites counts as competition, along with mobile providers 4g and 5g offerings.
If Openreach are not bothering with you as not enough money in it and the community won't pay up themselves, perhaps just be grateful someone else bothered
Dave_ST220 said:
They can mole cables in.
Yes, I'm aware that there are options out there to do it, but realistically as an infrastructure provider you're going to select the most cost effective option, especially when you're offering free installation.The problem with people around here is that to them, they're perfectly happy to miss out if it means having poles installed, which leaves the rest of us missing out.
I had two leased line quotes one with some digging and one with some poles and they were £112k and £52k respectively
I could probably drop that to £25k if i could do the digging myself around farmland (landowner is onboard).
Its easy to see how burying stuff under roads costs dramatically more than other options.
I'm not convinced on wireless. I'm using a fixed wireless ISP and two LTE providers using professionally roof-mounted radios, and I'll have starlink and 5G as soon as its available.
I'd rather have a single decent fibre connection than 5 half decent wireless/cellular connections. Short of having your own private microwave link you just can't guarantee any consistency of service given the inherent contention and limitations of the available spectrum. Thats before you get onto the fact that wired will always be orders of magnitude ahead in bandwidth terms.
I could probably drop that to £25k if i could do the digging myself around farmland (landowner is onboard).
Its easy to see how burying stuff under roads costs dramatically more than other options.
I'm not convinced on wireless. I'm using a fixed wireless ISP and two LTE providers using professionally roof-mounted radios, and I'll have starlink and 5G as soon as its available.
I'd rather have a single decent fibre connection than 5 half decent wireless/cellular connections. Short of having your own private microwave link you just can't guarantee any consistency of service given the inherent contention and limitations of the available spectrum. Thats before you get onto the fact that wired will always be orders of magnitude ahead in bandwidth terms.
There is definitely a boom time at the moment, with every man and his dog putting fibre in the ground.
There's funding flying in from the middle east, far east, banks, venture capitalists... it's a gold rush.
There will be two strategies:
1) Get acquired by a teir1 or larger teir2 provider.
2) Become a larger teir2 provide and raise more capital and do the acquiring.
There will definitely be a load of consolidation in the future, but at the moment it's just the rush to get every scrap of ground dug up until everyone is connected. As that phase comes to an end, the consolidation will start.
There's funding flying in from the middle east, far east, banks, venture capitalists... it's a gold rush.
There will be two strategies:
1) Get acquired by a teir1 or larger teir2 provider.
2) Become a larger teir2 provide and raise more capital and do the acquiring.
There will definitely be a load of consolidation in the future, but at the moment it's just the rush to get every scrap of ground dug up until everyone is connected. As that phase comes to an end, the consolidation will start.
TheBinarySheep said:
Dave_ST220 said:
They can mole cables in.
Yes, I'm aware that there are options out there to do it, but realistically as an infrastructure provider you're going to select the most cost effective option, especially when you're offering free installation.The problem with people around here is that to them, they're perfectly happy to miss out if it means having poles installed, which leaves the rest of us missing out.
TheBinarySheep said:
The problem with people around here is that to them, they're perfectly happy to miss out if it means having poles installed, which leaves the rest of us missing out.
They could well change their minds when they see how much more difficult it will be to sell up without fibre.Sheepshanks said:
TheBinarySheep said:
Dave_ST220 said:
They can mole cables in.
Yes, I'm aware that there are options out there to do it, but realistically as an infrastructure provider you're going to select the most cost effective option, especially when you're offering free installation.The problem with people around here is that to them, they're perfectly happy to miss out if it means having poles installed, which leaves the rest of us missing out.
Virgin look like they are going to go big into expanding their coverage with Openreach Physical Infrastructure Access (PIA) - which is running your own fibre through OR's ducts and poles to access premises. They've been doing a lot of exploratory work at Adastral Park around opening up existing ducts and they've even patented some special Toby boxes to make the install process simpler. The amount of effort they've gone to indicates they must be looking at PIA on serious scale.
Presumably its the establishment of universal ductwork which really matters rather than what goes inside them at this particular point in time.
I know I can't get fibre because the copper here was literally buried in the ground what may have been 60-70 years ago and thus can only be replaced at great expense.
Seeing as we managed to establish countrywide electricity, mains water and sewerage at some point in the past, it can't be beyond the wit of man to do the same for future-proof telecoms ducts.
There does seem to be a big push at the moment, to be fair.
I know I can't get fibre because the copper here was literally buried in the ground what may have been 60-70 years ago and thus can only be replaced at great expense.
Seeing as we managed to establish countrywide electricity, mains water and sewerage at some point in the past, it can't be beyond the wit of man to do the same for future-proof telecoms ducts.
There does seem to be a big push at the moment, to be fair.
theboss said:
Presumably its the establishment of universal ductwork which really matters rather than what goes inside them at this particular point in time.
I know I can't get fibre because the copper here was literally buried in the ground what may have been 60-70 years ago and thus can only be replaced at great expense.
Seeing as we managed to establish countrywide electricity, mains water and sewerage at some point in the past, it can't be beyond the wit of man to do the same for future-proof telecoms ducts.
There does seem to be a big push at the moment, to be fair.
This is the exact problem we're a having around here. They're able to lay the new fibre inside OpenReach ducts, but there are some estates which have had their cables directly buried underground. The only affordable option for the ISP is to install telephone poles, but residents complain about then so the ISP has had to pull the roll-out in some parts of the town on hold. I know I can't get fibre because the copper here was literally buried in the ground what may have been 60-70 years ago and thus can only be replaced at great expense.
Seeing as we managed to establish countrywide electricity, mains water and sewerage at some point in the past, it can't be beyond the wit of man to do the same for future-proof telecoms ducts.
There does seem to be a big push at the moment, to be fair.
The ISP are rolling out right across County Durham, and at the minute it's a patchwork of availability due to people not wanting telephone poles put up. The town that I'm in, some parts can get BT FTTP, some parts can get Virgin, some parts get get YouFibre FTTP and the rest have FTTC. It's only a fairly small town as well.
TheBinarySheep said:
This is the exact problem we're a having around here. They're able to lay the new fibre inside OpenReach ducts, but there are some estates which have had their cables directly buried underground. The only affordable option for the ISP is to install telephone poles, but residents complain about then so the ISP has had to pull the roll-out in some parts of the town on hold.
The ISP are rolling out right across County Durham, and at the minute it's a patchwork of availability due to people not wanting telephone poles put up. The town that I'm in, some parts can get BT FTTP, some parts can get Virgin, some parts get get YouFibre FTTP and the rest have FTTC. It's only a fairly small town as well.
Yep, my first leased line quote was over £100k based on digging (down a recently resurfaced road - that would have made me popular)The ISP are rolling out right across County Durham, and at the minute it's a patchwork of availability due to people not wanting telephone poles put up. The town that I'm in, some parts can get BT FTTP, some parts can get Virgin, some parts get get YouFibre FTTP and the rest have FTTC. It's only a fairly small town as well.
The second quote was just over £50k, less than half the price, and involved telegraph poles. 44 of them IIRC. This seemed ridiculously archaic.
I'm awaiting a third quote based on mole ploughing around the edges of fields not needing to go near any road, with the co-operation of the landowner.
Am more likely to just move house at this rate with FTTP or leased line availability being a hard requirement.
quinny100 said:
You've got the likes of B4RN who are not for profit and do a lot of dig over farmers fields using volunteer labour - I get that too for those areas that will never be commercially viable..
I've got B4RN. It's fab. Uncontended, full-duplex, gigabit FTTP for £30/mth. But the coverage area is very small.Edited by Zumbruk on Wednesday 15th September 13:44
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