MANs not enough

STaN

From SiliconRepublic...

If the €12m Government metropolitan area network (MAN) in Cork to is to have a serious commercial impact on the city, Cork City Council will have to encourage the creation of a regional data centre or co-location facility, have multiple access points and encourage State agencies like CIE and ESB to open up their backhaul fibre networks to competition, a critical report has warned.

The report by PA Consulting, which benchmarks Cork against five other European cities in terms of internet connectivity and commercial and domestic broadband usage, drove home the point that the purpose of the 60km Cork MAN – the first of 19 such networks to be lit – is to accelerate the decline of broadband prices in the region, attract more service providers to the market and reduce prices charged by Eircom and Esat BT in the region.

The report illustrates that simply having a MAN live is only the beginning of the battle for all-pervasive, and affordable, broadband services in Irish towns and cities.

The report compares Cork with the cities of Aarhus in Denmark, Aberdeen in Scotland, Bilbao in Spain, Montpellier in France and Tampere in Finland. It said that while Cork performs strongly in terms of Internet penetration, government prioritisation, and promotion of ICT, it performs poorly in terms of the amount of external business correspondence done using email, broadband access and public access to the Internet.

“The lack of competition in the Cork telecommunications market when compared to other European cities is a disadvantage. Moreover, the prices of broadband services in Cork are the highest among the six cities. Based on the analysis, Cork’s competitiveness and attractiveness as a location for ICT is greater than Aberdeen’s, but lags behind that of Tampere and Aarhus, and (on balance) would be on par with Bilbao and Montpellier,” the report said.

Looking at the current telecoms landscape in Cork, the report emphasised that Eircom and Esat BT were the dominant providers, although their main purpose of doing business in Cork is to serve the needs of multinational corporations and not those of consumers and SMEs. These multinationals mostly use dedicated leased lines of 2Mbps while some have 34Mbps services and it is expected that some of these will shortly move to 1Gbps services. Most SMEs in the region have ISDN access, and some are considering a move to DSL. The majority of residential users in the marketplace depend on 56k dial-up.

Using Cork as the template, the PA Consulting report emphasised that unless the national backhaul issue was resolved, many of the MANs would be virtually useless. It indicated that Eircom and Esat BT are quoting extremely high prices for wholesale backhaul from Cork to Dublin. Although ESB Telecom’s €120m backhaul will undercut their prices by 20-30pc, PA said that it is “still not low enough to provide alternative provider with prices that are affordable and will create effective competition.”

For the Cork MAN to be successful, PA warned that there is a need to create a carrier-neutral point of presence (PoP) in Cork where service providers could locate without any one service provider having control of the facility. Such a data centre could start off on a reasonable small scale and then grow as data service requirements grow. As part of a longer-term strategy, the development of a regional Internet Neutral Exchange (INEX) should be a priority and should be investigated.

The report also called for the creation of multiple, rather than a single, points of access between national networks and the Cork City MAN and therefore the provision of back-up facilities for the carrier-neutral PoP would ensure resilience. “The Cork City MAN will effectively be competing with Eircom and Esat BT’s city networks, and therefore must offer other service providers flexibilty in terms of where they wish to interconnection with national and international networks.

“In the absence of a carrier-neutral national backhaul network, customers will have to use either Eircom or Esat BT,” PA warned.

PA indicated that there are State-owned national fibre networks that collectively have sufficient geographical reach to facilitate a low cost comprehensive national backhaul network. ESB Telecom has a 1,300km fibre network that covers most towns and cities in teh country. In addition, CIE owns dark fibre on Esat BT’s 2,000km fibre network that is laid along the railway network. “Therefore, the critical recommendation that this report makes in relationa to the national backhaul issue is that State-owned fibre networks are utilised to deliver low cost national backhaul,” the report said.

In terms of the Managed Services Entity (MSE) that will oversee the Government’s €170m investment in its National Broadband Strategy, PA warned that the MSE must operate to a level of excellence that will enable other service providers to win over business from Eircom and Esat BT. If it doesn’t operate to a level of excellence, it will dilute the confidence of potential service providers, erode the chance for success of the Cork City MAN and therefore substantially reduce the return on the State’s investment.

The PA Consulting report was compiled prior to the Government’s appointment of a company to run the MSE. It is understood that a consortium led by Limerick property developer Tiernan Properties has been selected as the preferred bidder for the Government’s broadband network. The consortium, led by Tiernan Properties’ telecoms subsidiary eNet, includes a spin-off from Eircom called TE Services and Swedish firm Swedia.

While the Government’s plan is currently to build MANs that will span 19 regional towns, it is expected that the Government will also extend these networks to about 88 towns over the next few years.

oscarBravo

Originally posted by STaN
Using Cork as the template, the PA Consulting report emphasised that unless the national backhaul issue was resolved, many of the MANs would be virtually useless.

Amen.

dahamsta

I was chatting to a network engineer about the Cork MAN in the pub recently. He suggested that the MAN is not in fact lit, but that service providers have to "take over" a portion of the MAN before it will be lit. I thought that was a rather odd way to go about things, but he was insistent. Anyone care to comment on how these MAN's will actually work?

adam

bminish

Originally posted by dahamsta
I was chatting to a network engineer about the Cork MAN in the pub recently. He suggested that the MAN is not in fact lit, but that service providers have to "take over" a portion of the MAN before it will be lit. I thought that was a rather odd way to go about things, but he was insistent. Anyone care to comment on how these MAN's will actually work?

adam

Well, as a far as I understand it anyway. In the absence of an MSE (& perhaps even with an MSE when it arrives?) you can now light fibre by renting fibre from the council + there is a 1 off access charge for ' opening it up' all terribly cost effective if you want a 2.5 Gbs from one side of Kiltimagh to the other, a bit expensive if all you really need is 2 mbs and about a useless as a chocolate teapot if you are looking for backhaul to somewhere useful.
The MAN's don't do backhaul, they may in some areas be able to get you to a backhaul provider and hopefully Someone will see a business case for buying man fibre to offer backhaul services on the smaller MAN's

In Cork, it is my understanding that Smart have bought fibre access since you don't need the MSE to be set up to deal direct with the council (What exactly is the MSE going to do for us again.. ? ) and rent fibre.

Smart have also bought capacity on the ESB fibre network to get from Cork to Dublin (& presumably other places too) this puts Smart in a position to offer services via the Cork man but I wonder if all the little MAN's (especially those that are not near potential backhaul such as ESB fibre ) will end up with any service providers on them since the business case must be much weaker.

.Brendan

thegills

Why oh why are people paying these consultants to draft a report stating the obvious. It is common knowledge that all MANs will require backhaul back to Dublin and they will need a POP to house telco kit.

The Cork MAN is not complete, but the powers that be in Cork wanted to launch for the publicity.

There are arrangements in place between Galway CC and Esat BT and between Smart and Cork CC (Details of interim lease agreements on the DCMNR website)

The MAN's don't do backhaul

Correct, but the DCMNR and Magnum Opus (technical advisors) have leant on the MAN network designers to connect into every available backhaul source. Eg: the Limerick MAN will connect into eircom, Esat BT, Chorus, WDC, Aurora and ESBT when complete. Hibernia Atlantic will probably buy capacity from ESBT or Aurora and also on the MAN's so they will be offering an all-in-one solution.

Anyone care to comment on how these MAN's will actually work

The Local Authority will own the MAN which will be leased to the MSE via the DCMNR. The LA will get an agreed annual lump sum from the MSE.
The MSE will maintain, manage and advertise the MAN
The DCMNR will have certain controls over the prices advertised by the MSE to ensure price standardisation across all MAN's (so that MAN's aren't competing with each other)

thegills

thegills

Why oh why are people paying these consultants to draft a report stating the obvious. It is common knowledge that all MANs will require backhaul back to Dublin and they will need a POP to house telco kit.

The Cork MAN is not complete, but the powers that be in Cork wanted to launch for the publicity.

There are arrangements in place between Galway CC and Esat BT and between Smart and Cork CC (Details of interim lease agreements on the DCMNR website)

The MAN's don't do backhaul

Correct, but the DCMNR and mabnum opus have leant on the MAN designesr to connect into every available backhaul source. Eg: the Limerick MAN will connect into eircom, Esat BT, Chorus, WDC, Aurora and ESBT when complete. Hibernia Atlantic will probably buy capacity from ESBT or Aurora and also on the MAN's so they will be offering an all-in0one solution.

Anyone care to comment on how these MAN's will actually work

The Local Authority will own the MAN which will be leased to the MSE via the DCMNR. The LA will get an agreed annual lump sum from the MSE.
The MSE will maintain, manage and advertise the MAN
The DCMNR will have certain controls over the prices advertised by the MSE to ensure price standardisation across all MAN's (so that MAN's aren't competing with each other)

thegills

spongebob

Originally posted by thegills
There are arrangements in place between Galway CC and Esat BT and between Smart and Cork CC (Details of interim lease agreements on the DCMNR website)

Do you have to take a full fibre pair on a MAN as in all around the network and not from point x to point y where you actually require it?

An example in the case of the Cork MAN would be that you would have to lease 50km even if your POP and customers were on a 5KM run from a given point !

Thats because the fibre ring in Cork is 50Km long in total .

M

bminish

Originally posted by Muck
Do you have to take a full fibre pair on a MAN as in all around the network and not from point x to point y where you actually require it?

M

According to the CO Sec in the Mayo Co Co you can have just the bit you need however they don't want to sell 100m lengths either, I suppose all that MAN fibre is in ducting that one can access for the purposes of short runs, then of course there is always that duct sharing agreement with Eircom to fall back on for short runs

Pricing in Ballina is I believe 18c per M per fibre per year. Presumably when HE said per fibre he really means per pair since single fibre isn't all that useful.

.Brendan

thegills

According to the CO Sec in the Mayo Co Co

Without sounding smart, only the MSE will ulimately know

Do you have to take a full fibre pair on a MAN as in all around the network and not from point x to point y where you actually require it

In Cork the MAN is not fully complete so it would be impossible to take a full fibre pair.

If you think about it though it's pointless just selling a point x to point y link as you would render the rest of the fibre loop useless. You may also restrict diversity. What should happen is that a telco will take a loop or two. They would then connect into a customer and aggregate the customers signal onto the loop using an appropriate technology (DWDM, Gigabit Ethernet for eg.). The kit in the POP would then sort out all off the customers signals.

In Galway, Esat BT wanted to connect to a big customer so they took a point x to point y link. This is just an interim solution until the MSE is in place.

spongebob

Originally posted by thegills
If you think about it though it's pointless just selling a point x to point y link as you would render the rest of the fibre loop useless.

Fair Point.

Thanks.

M

BigEejit

how many fibres are in the Cork trunk does anyone know? ... I would have said 100's and they are probably the same around the country but knowing the forward planning that goes on in Ireland whats going around Cork is a multi-mode single pair with repeaters every 500 meters :rolleyes:

bminish

Originally posted by Muck
Fair Point.

Thanks.

M

Well there is more than one pair and the Co Sec certainly didn't tell me that I needed to buy an entire ring just to do P to P. It was back in November when I was talking to the Co sec, it might be worth a call to Mayo CC (094) 90 244 44 to clear the matter up.

.Brendan

thegills

how many fibres are in the Cork trunk does anyone know

Standard 48 pairs across all MAN projects. If there are multiple rings then the fibre count will increase where rings cross-over.

If you want a point-to-point you may have to go through a telco who has already lease a fibre loop from the MSE.

AFAIK there are no guidelines yet as to what the services will be and at what cost. On some MAN's there are interim agreements in place just to plug the gap until the MSE arrives.

The CC will have to become a licenced operator if they want to start offering services.

repeaters every 500 meters

No need for these Muck. The kit in the POP will be able to light a whole fibre ring. The fibre comes in 2km lengths.

spongebob

Originally posted by thegills

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repeaters every 500 meters

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No need for these Muck. The kit in the POP will be able to light a whole fibre ring. The fibre comes in 2km lengths.

<Cough>

It wasn't I who said that, some of us know the difference between SX and LX Gigabit Ethernet !

M

BigEejit

Indeed ... I said 500 meters ...thats multimode, used in datacentres - SANs and 1000baseSX ... I was (in a roundablout way) saying that the MANs might have suffered the usual government shortsightedness and gone for the cheapest nastiest fibre going ... (and I know multimode can go to 2KM's but most installations dont ... if you want distance and speed you go for singlemode.)