Eircom follow the Sponge and Offer Government 100% of Exchanges Upgraded

Sponge Bob · 06-04-2006 10:21am #1

Hot on the heels of Sponge Bobs 2 90's rule comes an interesting offer from eircom to the government which is not totally at variance with my 2 90's rule as originally posted in here.

Basically I said that .

If eircom did exchanges covering 90% of lines themselves
And if eircom guaranteed that 90% of lines on the remainder of the exchanges passed for BB within reasonable distance limits (5km) on day one
And if the whole project came in under/around €70m (thats €100k per exchange tops )

Then this Sponge would look favourably on such a scheme.

In Silicon Republic today eircom have made just such a basic offer although being eircom it has strings and is not fully compliant with Sponge Bobs 2 90's rule.

1. They now claim that 85% of lines are connected to enabled exchanges not 90%

2. They have not offered an SLA. Some exchanges will have 100% failure rates because of the shoddiness of eircoms own copper unless they do so there is no point in spending money enabling them is there ? . Sponge Bobs second 90 prevents such a farce from occuring and prevents waste of public money on it .

3. They want €60m for the scheme.

BUT

Eircom have stated to SR that they will enable 700 exchanges for €60m , being €86k each. This is not an entirely ridiculous figure.

It may well indicate, primarily, that that they feel that the government voice and data contract , negotiated every year around this time , is not in the bag as usual .

Nor is there a timeline or schedule for this offer/punt/scheme/whatever. This should all be done in one year flat , ending 30 June 2007, given the horrendous lack of BB in Ireland and the yawning gap that urgently needs to be closed with the developed world ....which developed world we left with alacrity upon the creation of Comreg and the privatisation of eircom.

Nor are there cast iron guarantees that Fibre Cabs pushed out from enabled exchanges will always come with DSL built in in future so that the government does not have to subsidise another 700 exchanges next year as well because they were rolled out with no DSL capability .

Nor are there any indications as to precisely what eircom will do to the 3.5Ghz spectrum they have squatted for years ....or the rumours that they are looking at buying a scad of totally new gear for that spectrum and ditching Airspan .

Additionally there is evidence that eircom see their monopoly on the last mile being chewed at by the more competent Wireless providers and eircom would be wise if they realised that the highest line rental on the planet is a lot of margin for other operators to START with

.

Therefore Why not punt out a €60m tender, the amount suggested by Eircom, to EVERYBODY and ask What do we get for our €60m investment ?? .

Do we get 100% of exchanges and c. 70% of lines and households enabled or can we see 100% of households getting BB for the same price .....and not necessarily DSL ....or could we get eircom to form a consortium ????

Nevertheless by the usual low eircom standards this offer is very noteworthy and broadly to be welcomed . This is the first time that we have seen eircom recognise the provisioning of BB as a Universal Service and given the scale of the offer it will influence submissions into the USO review currently under way over in Comreg.

“We’ve been discussing this with the Government and they’ve known for a while that this is what we want to do,” the spokesman added. Such an investment could cost an estimated €60m and it would mean that full broadband availability would happen “a lot quicker than doing it one by one through the Group Broadband Scheme”.

Of course those dopey fuks in SR did not realise, as usual, that 100% of exchanges with DSL in theml != 100% of lines with DSL given line failures and distances from exchanges but SR will not edit their puff piece for accuracy

. Nor did McRedmond allow his name to be used

damien · 06-04-2006 11:59am

Eircom also released figures which claim to show that its level of investment in the telecoms network, at €200m per year, is above the average of its European peers.

Ah yes, that old nugget. The way they calculate it is investment as a % of earnings. eircom's earnings go down year on year. Most European telcos go up. So they are investing more and more but their % remains static or decreases but if eircom invests the same every year their % goes up. Tis a good PR trick.

eircom are using NI as a model but let us compare. 99.16% pass rate on all phone lines up there. Of the .84% that can't get broadband on their lines, BT offer wireless and satellite at £29 a month. They cannot charge more, the idea being they can subsidise it from their other dsl profits.

The BIG BIG issue is that BT are enabling all exchanges anyway as in the UK but that NI gave them cash to speed it up and make sure NI was the first region to reach 100% availability. It wasn't Govt money that gave a low failure rate, it was BT investing and making sure their lines were healthy. eircom should not get a penny until they fix their network. They get enough from line rental and still don't provide a proper working line to 1000s of customers.

Sponge Bob · 06-04-2006 12:09pm

damien.m wrote:

Ah yes, that old nugget. The way they calculate it is investment as a % of earnings. eircom's earnings go down year on year. Most European telcos go up. So they are investing more and more but their % remains static or decreases but if eircom invests the same every year their % goes up. Tis a good PR trick.

and another of their poles falls out over the road where I live

The BIG BIG issue is that BT are enabling all exchanges anyway as in the UK but that NI gave them cash to speed it up and make sure NI was the first region to reach 100% availability.

and Wales (100% of exchanges with DSL anyway) and Yorkshire, a county nearly the size of Connacht, 100% of exchanges with DSL. NI is the only bit where 100% of households can get 512k though.

It wasn't Govt money that gave a low failure rate, it was BT investing and making sure their lines were healthy. eircom should not get a penny until they fix their network. They get enough from line rental and still don't provide a proper working line to 1000s of customers.

The SLA would be good enough for me given the ****heap that eircom calls a 'network' .

If 90% of DISCRETE PREMISES within 5KM Cable Length can get DSL the day the exchange is switched on, latest June 2007, I will declare them compliant. Some premises are up to about 15km from their exchange in this country. 10km is not unusual but all would require repeating . Lets stick to what DSL , and the laws of physics

, can do.

Those not in the 90% or beyond 5km should get a reduced line rental until a program to install repetaers on request is in place which is how BT operate out to 10-12km .

damien · 06-04-2006 1:01pm

Sponge Bob wrote:

Some premises are up to about 15km from their exchange in this country. 10km is not unusual but all would require repeating . Lets stick to what DSL , and the laws of physics , can do.

This is why anyone that can't get dsl should be given wireless or satellite at max price of 30 quid a month. eircom then cannot say no if someone wants broadband.

Sponge Bob · 06-04-2006 1:23pm

damien.m wrote:

This is why anyone that can't get dsl should be given wireless or satellite at max price of 30 quid a month. eircom then cannot say no if someone wants broadband.

Don't get me wrong damien.

Universal DSL in the exchange is only part of the technology matrix needed for Universal BB in Ireland. Those whose lines are deemed 'uneconomic' despite their being forced to pay the highest line rental on the planet every month should get Universal BB by means other than DSL.

Then there is the issue of rural areas which have a more elderly population and whose lines the government pays for thru the Dept of Social welfare allowance . This constitutes a greater subsidy to eircom in Rural areas than in Urban areas . Were elderly persons in rural areas forced to pay €24.20 a month themselves just to have a line they would take a hatchet to the poles instead

Nor will eircom FIX rural lines EXCEPT to carry BB ....and there is no BB at present so they won't fix them , chicken/egg .

However in my opinion the beginning of a Universal DSL service is to enable all exchanges, that end alone is a worthwhile discussion for a cost of €60m or so and within the paramaters I elaborated above.

Other universal(ish) schemes out there recently were the Universal Urban Hi Speed FTTH/HFC scheme costing €2Bn punted by the Chambers of Commerce and Tommy McCabe from IBEC effectively demanding a risible €5Bn to guarantee us all Satellite systems capable of 5Mbits ....my God that Tommy is a gas man , sure a whole Sat just for us Paddies would only cost €3-400m Tommy including the launch

. What could we call that ponders this Sponge , HotTurd 1 ????

Compared to some of those proposals the €60m , €0.06Bn , is one worth investigating although McRedmond must have had a good reason for the non attribution and I would not overly congratulate or thank eircom unless he said the same thing on the record and offered my second '90' as a guaranteed SLA .

Blaster99 · 06-04-2006 2:06pm

If I were at the negotiating table, I would not let them off with this 5km bollocks either. 10km or another alternative at their cost.

Does this eircom offer include all the sub exchanges that a lot of rural folk are on?

Sponge Bob · 06-04-2006 2:16pm

subs are cabinets and are mainly urban , this includes all rural exchanges but not subs as I make it

bealtine · 06-04-2006 3:52pm

I noticed another little kicker in there:

"Other operators will be able to provide services to their customers through the broadband-enabled exchanges but the spokesman emphasised that this would be on a bitstream basis — reselling Eircom’s wholesale services — as opposed to full local loop unbundling. "

I read that to say abandon LLU and we'll do this (for a fee of course)...

lucernarian · 06-04-2006 5:18pm

For things like sub exchanges isn't there a special LLU product for them? I don't really know how it works but I think it's called sub loop insertion. Can anyone confirm this?

The problem I have with this investment figure is that there is no provision made for these sub exchanges or the installation of pairgains in areas and attention needs to be paid to these details before money is thrown away on enabling an exchange that will have fibre cabinets served by it. I accept though that the remaining 700 exchanges are not likely to have any cabinets working off them, let alone fibre cabinets so hopefully this will not be an issue.

The key point about this is that there is no point enabling an exchange with a faliure rate of say 70% which serves say 300 lines. It would be a waste of money to install a full DSLAM to serve a potential market of 90 lines. Sponge Bob is correct in saying that a SLA of some description is needed.

Sponge Bob wrote:

Were elderly persons in rural areas forced to pay €24.20 a month themselves just to have a line they would take a hatchet to the poles instead Nor will eircom FIX rural lines EXCEPT to carry BB ....and there is no BB at present so they won't fix them , chicken/egg .

To be fair to eircom, they have removed all the pairgains on my road in the last week or two. They had most of them removed last summer. Now these lines are longer than mine, the longest being around 9.5 km. They took 12 lines off pairgains and had to hang up about 2 km of extra 30-pair cable. The point is that there is some investment but limited and it is very patchy.

Wiring can also totally change when you enter another exchange area for no reason. Carrickmacross has some dire examples of phone wires which could pass if the pairgains and other problems were cleared up. Eircom should spend their own money better before asking for the government's.

P.S. the SR article has a glaring mistake for those living in Co. Louth in that Castlebellingham has moved to Co. Westmeath.:)

Sponge Bob · 06-04-2006 5:34pm

To_be_confirmed wrote:

For things like sub exchanges isn't there a special LLU product for them? I don't really know how it works but I think it's called sub loop insertion. Can anyone confirm this?

there may be but there is no process document that I know of so its impossible

The problem I have with this investment figure is that there is no provision made for these sub exchanges or the installation of pairgains in areas and attention needs to be paid to these details before money is thrown away on enabling an exchange that will have fibre cabinets served by it. I accept though that the remaining 700 exchanges are not likely to have any cabinets working off them, let alone fibre cabinets so hopefully this will not be an issue.

I do know that where FIBRE backhauled cabinets have been deployed then TO MY knowledge that they are listed as Exchanges thereafter .

The key point about this is that there is no point enabling an exchange with a faliure rate of say 70% which serves say 300 lines. It would be a waste of money to install a full DSLAM to serve a potential market of 90 lines. Sponge Bob is correct in saying that a SLA of some description is needed.

90% within 5km line length otherwise not a sausage......and free Flat Rate for 100% of the victims connected to that exchange after 30th June 2007 until it is enabled and does 90% . The government should quite simply not get involved without an SLA based on Universal Access principles within a reasonable distance because DSL is distance limited and our rural exchanges are typically greater than that distance apart .

niallb · 06-04-2006 5:37pm

Compulsary LLU should be forced on them in the case of lines
failing the test for bitstream technology if the customer has
requested Broadband.

5km is pushing it for Eircom DSL, but we know alternatives
exist which can push it much further - at a reduced speed.

Always on even at 256k would be a huge upgrade for many,
and save people a fortune. (Ah, maybe that's it!)

NiallB

6.2km from a recently enabled exchange :-)

Sponge Bob · 06-04-2006 5:41pm

All the fibre cabs I personally know of are now deemed to be exchanges but I have been told that not all fibre cabs are deemed to be exchanges, some are seen as upmarket pairgains .

Damned if I know what the difference is though .

watty · 06-04-2006 5:59pm

Isn't LLU eventually, somehow mandatory? Like Eircom would have to convince not just our own men but EU also?

eircomtribunal · 06-04-2006 6:21pm

watty wrote:

Isn't LLU eventually, somehow mandatory? Like Eircom would have to convince not just our own men but EU also?

Yeah, but they seem to have managed to convince the Aussies otherwise.
P.
P.S.: in the meantime they rather keep installing ISDN.

uncle_sam_ie · 06-04-2006 7:57pm

niallb wrote:

6.2km from a recently enabled exchange :-)

In the UK their going as far as 10Km. I'm only 5.2 Km from my exchange that was just upgraded, but fail the line test. And, thats on a new ISDN line that was strung from the exchange five years ago. I bet eircon could get it to work if they really wanted to. I could live with 256k always on.

What is the absolute maximum distance for DSL?

useruser · 06-04-2006 9:45pm

To_be_confirmed wrote:

The key point about this is that there is no point enabling an exchange with a faliure rate of say 70% which serves say 300 lines. It would be a waste of money to install a full DSLAM to serve a potential market of 90 lines. Sponge Bob is correct in saying that a SLA of some description is needed.

DSLAMs don't have to be huge, look at Ericsson's IP DSLAMs for example - 24 VDSL/ADSL2+ ports in a package the size of a paperback book, there are hardened versions for pole mounting etc. Some small remote DSLAMs can be line powered. A cabinet with 300 lines can be served cost effectively, it just requires a little innovation.

Absolutely agree on the SLA, what would be the point in giving money to Eircom to build out their network only to be told "we can't serve any of those difficult users?"

lucernarian · 06-04-2006 9:47pm

The most optimised version of ADSL2 for long distance could go to over 7 km but speeds would be lower than 512 kbps at that range. It also depends on the copper cabling in use. The ADSL2 variant I mentioned above can sync at 89 dB line attenuation but this would be the minimum speed possible. Anything farther than 7 odd km needs a repeater for the modem to sync. I'm open to be corrected about that btw.

lucernarian · 06-04-2006 9:49pm

useruser wrote:

DSLAMs don't have to be huge, look at Ericsson's IP DSLAMs for example - 24 VDSL/ADSL2+ ports in a package the size of a paperback book, there are hardened versions for pole mounting etc. Some small remote DSLAMs can be line powered. A cabinet with 300 lines can be served cost effectively, it just requires a little innovation.

Absolutely agree on the SLA, what would be the point in giving money to Eircom to build out their network only to be told "we can't serve any of those difficult users?"

The DSLAMs that eircom use are quite large. I am unaware of eircom using any other DSLAMs. Does anyone know for definite if Eircom use smaller DSLAMs?

useruser · 06-04-2006 9:56pm

To_be_confirmed wrote:

The DSLAMs that eircom use are quite large. I am unaware of eircom using any other DSLAMs. Does anyone know for sure?

I believe they use Alcatel who also have a "mini DSLAM" product, which is not to say that Eircom is somehow obliged to use Alcatel only. There are many vendors of these cabinet DSLAMs to choose from.

Sponge Bob · 06-04-2006 9:58pm

they use some different Alcatel DSLAMs , the Alcatel 7329 model will supply 24 ports, has a pairgain built in for pots and can be mounted on a pole , requires no air conditioning and is weatherproof .

http://www.alcatel.com/products/productsummary.jhtml?relativePath=/com/en/appxml/opgproduct/alcatel7329remoteunittcm228295091635.jhtml

thats what you use in a small exchange

lucernarian · 06-04-2006 10:04pm

That's interesting. I guess that DSLAM is what was used in those exchange upgrades on Wednesday?

Sponge Bob · 06-04-2006 10:36pm

up to now they got a full rack of gear containing an alcatel 7300 but that would be overkill in some areas so the 7329 is slaved off a 7300 for deployment at distance and is how _SOME_ professional telcos get past the 5km barrier for 1mbits . In Ireland it will have to do the whole parish .

http://www.alcatel.com/doctypes/opgproductbrochure/pdfa4/7300_etsi_bro.pdf

eircomtribunal · 10-04-2006 1:34pm

http://www.rte.ie/business/2006/0410/CCI.html

P.

lucernarian · 10-04-2006 2:35pm

Sponge Bob wrote:

up to now they got a full rack of gear containing an alcatel 7300 but that would be overkill in some areas so the 7329 is slaved off a 7300 for deployment at distance and is how _SOME_ professional telcos get past the 5km barrier for 1mbits . In Ireland it will have to do the whole parish .

Thanks for the info. So those small exchanges have 7300's in them? Is there any middle step between the 7329 with 24 ports and the 7300, with thousands, that eircom will use?

Sponge Bob · 10-04-2006 2:43pm

To_be_confirmed wrote:

Thanks for the info. So those small exchanges have 7300's in them? Is there any middle step between the 7329 with 24 ports and the 7300, with thousands, that eircom will use?

The 7300 deployed in recent upgrades is the 7300-c (c for compact) model with 120 ports

http://www.alcatel.com/doctypes/opgdatasheet/html/a7300-c.jhtml

lucernarian · 10-04-2006 3:16pm

Good stuff. Cheers SB.

bk · 10-04-2006 3:32pm

Sponge Bob wrote:

The 7300 deployed in recent upgrades is the 7300-c (c for compact) model with 120 ports

http://www.alcatel.com/doctypes/opgdatasheet/html/a7300-c.jhtml

And that is just for one shelf, they can have up to 12 (1,440 lines), depending on space in the exchange

Eircom follow the Sponge and Offer Government 100% of Exchanges Upgraded

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