Really – 80% FTTP in UK by 2026? Woah, ambitious!

That new builds should be legally required to be FTTP is beyond obvious. I can't believe it's not currently the case.

The only spanner?

Considering the ludicrously low rate of new builds in the UK, isn't that another spanner?

Also before we get too carried away with fibre to the home, how quick and cheap are repairs to accidentally cut fibres? (When a scaffolder snags my "wire" to the pole down the road, a repair is easy.)

Some weird adapter?

What's wrong with running copper alongside the fiber, and using it in the meantime? Though really, there's exactly ZERO point to having fiber running into the house. Run copper to the nearest corner, and interface with fiber there. Running fiber into every home just makes things cost more, because you will still have "some weird adapter" in every house to turn it back into copper.

Start by mandating that all new-builds must be provided FTTP

Openreach have been supplying cable with copper and fibre cores for some years now for use in new developments. I think the mandate isn't so much the need for a weird adaptor but to simply require those fibre cores to be connected between street cabinet and premises on largescale developments (ie. any development that requires the installation of new street cabinets). Then when the local exchange goes fibre, it is only necessary to run fibre from the exchange to the street cabinets.

Re: When a Telco installs fiber...

I'm not sure if the UK situation is similar to North America, where the twisted pair Telco has to compete with the coaxial cable Cable TV company.

The UK situation is slightly different, ignoring quad-play bundling. We basically have Virgin, which is a co-ax Cable TV company with a growing fibre network and BT a twisted-pair Telco with a growing fibre network which is enabling it to offer 'Cable TV' services.

However, we also have Sky, who are a satellite TV company and want to be in the fibre Cable TV business and TalkTalk who are a relatively new Telco who also want a slice of the fibre Cable TV action. The issue is that neither Sky or TalkTalk have their own network and to remain competitive against Virgin, are dependent upon BT delivering a fibre infrastructure; ... Hence why these two players are the leading lights in beating BT up, both to deliver FTTC/FTTP quicker and cheaper and to reduce the monies BT has to develop it's own 'Cable TV' offering...

Re: "have access to FTTP"

I think the "have access to FTTP" includes me. The telegraph pole outside my house now has a fiber manifold on it and from the BT website I see I could get BT Infinity 4 for a 300Mb/s connection. Unfortunately the cost is £52/month on top of the £19/month line rental and I just don't need the bandwidth as my ADSL+ that costs almost nothing on top of the line rental and runs at 13mb/s is adequate for everything I need.

Re: "have access to FTTP"

I think means being able to buy an FTTP service in the same way that you or I can buy an ADSL service today. Or perhaps more accurately, a bit like how you or I could buy Virgin's cable service today, assuming their infrastructure passes your premises.

Re: What about the 20%?

"This is getting ridiculous. What about getting that 20% group up to speed? It is too easy to flood a high density populated city with fibre and make easy profits. But there is zero incentive for Openreach and the rest of the to bring the countryside up to speed."

It's a difficult economic problem. There's no answer that satisfies everyone.

Rural deployment costs far more than urban deployment and there are less customers available per pound invested. Pricing FTTP in rural areas with a reasonable return on investment means that very few households will actually take up the service - making the investment problem even worse. Even in urban areas, most people who have the option of a premium broadband option don't take it. Most consumers choose solely on price.

If the telco takes a long term view and accepts that repaying the investment might take 20 years or more and prices appropriately that causes a problem for other networks because they can't get close to the same price and be profitable. It looks to competitors like predatory pricing, which is illegal under the Competition Act. People will be upset if Openreach are instructed to deliver FTTP to rural areas but also to price it at £100 per month to give Virgin and others a chance to compete with their own networks.

In a century we haven't found a way of economically delivering mains gas and sewers to most rural areas and that's a model in which there's no competition.

TLDR: The cost of urban broadband deployment results in either pricing that customers won't pay or pricing that other network providers can't compete with. There's no current answer that resolves both problems.

Re: Building regs need to be changed as well!

> provide space in the home for 19" cabinet

Is this sarcasm? Not sure of the need for this in a small terraced house, and it would probably be accounted for in larger mansions - I'd instead encourage architecture university courses to update their design rules to adequately provision houses for their expected occupancy and use.

For example, from the ingress point of the broadband provision (fibre or copper), send the data-portion to a corner of the loft where a 4/8/16 port switch can be located, then Cat-6/7 to any relevant room (e.g. to where any TV is assumed to go, but you could well further future proof by running it to every plug socket). This will also require power to the loft, which is not that usual for new builds unless the purchaser requests it as an extra - equally not that difficult to retrofit as you can spur a low ampage socket off the lighting circuit.

It would also be nice if a wifi-plan could be produced at design time to minimise the APs you might need to get decent coverage in your house.

Internal BT-specified wiring is a bit redundant now, as you can either get an IP phone, or just DECT from the main socket.

Re: altnet's providing a wholesale service.

From when I looked at it, this in itself wasn't an issue. It was more that there was nothing in BDUK that placed any obligation on other operators to actually use our infrastructure rather than get BT (or other) to overbuild and thus destroy our RoI... Which really got to the fundamental flaw in the BDUK program; if the government seriously wanted private companies to deploy FTTP etc. as part of a national network then it is fairly obvious it had to define interconnect standards (interface and service-levels) so that households in my altnet area could subscribe to Sky and get service delivered over my FTTP network, rather than BT's sub-2mbps ADSL twisted-pair and Sky pay me for the usage of my infrastructure.

From the INCA website: "The members of the Independent Networks Co-operative Association (INCA) are supporting, planning, building and operating sustainable, independent and interconnected networks that advance the economic and social development of the communities they serve and permit the provision of applications and services through open competition, innovation and diversity. They will work together to create cohesive interconnected next generation networks." Which sounds to me like open access networks in the way that you describe.

On that note why not force VM to open up their co-ax as a wholesale network?

Re: Fuck BT

"Why not create a not for profit foundation and lay the fibre opitic lines and then lease them out to whoever. Pie in the sky? Yes. will it ever happen? Not sure, just going to look out of the window to see if there are any flying piggies going by."

Because it destroys the business of other companies - Colt, Virgin, Gigaclear.

They build networks because they can make a profit and so investors will lend them money to do it, expecting a return. If a not-for-profit was set up and sold connections for a lower price, those companies that have invested go bust. The markets would be furious with a government that deliberately sent private companies to the wall.

The not-for-profit would also have huge problems raising money - where's the return for investors? It would need to be publically funded, and then you might as well just nationalise Openreach. Unless you know of a 100,000 unemployed telecoms trained people the new foundation would employ the same people who work today at Openreach. The net result would be mostly the same organisation as Openreach but with less money to invest.

Re: Fuck BT

I totally agree and OFCOM are so useless it isn't even funny

Getting away from BT and yet I have to spend £10 on 0844 numbers to get to even speak to BT. How pathetic and curse on them for all time.

Re: *TP?

Or Time Protocol?