eBay chief 'embarassed' at level of broadband

bealtine

http://www.tribune.ie/article.tvt?_scope=Tribune/Business/Business%20Week&id=80650&SUBCAT=Tribune/Business

eBay chief 'embarassed' at level of broadband
Kevin Rafter Political Editor

THE managing director of on-line retailer eBay has slammed the government's record on broadband and warned that poor internet service is affecting Ireland's ability to get foreign companies to locate here.

In a hard hitting assessment of Irish broadband service, e-Bay's John McElligott stated: "I am embarrassed to tell my peers in other countries about Ireland's connectivity problems." His assessment - delivered in correspondence to the several politicians in recent weeks - said Ireland requires "a major leap in connectivity capabilities in terms of coverage, quality and speed".

McElligott's frank assessment will be hugely embarrassing for government ministers Eamon Ryan at communications and Michael Martin at enterprise, trade and employment. Last October Martin said that broadband availability was expanding and was "not inhibiting our attractiveness as a location for foreign direct investment". However, in the Dail last week he said the privatisation of Telecom Eireann had "caused difficulties" and that "we are playing catch up with regard to overall online applications, participation rates and penetration".

McElligott offered a stark opinion of Ireland's broadband position and warned about losing foreign investment opportunities. "I am comprehensively disappointed by what has been achieved to date, and highly concerned about the future, " he said. The eBay boss added that "companies look across the Atlantic and think 'we need a base in Europe'. It would be wonderful if Ireland was their chosen destination. At present, given our appalling infrastructure, of course we're not. Sadly for us, the UK is the destination of choice. I fear we will regret this."

Fine Gael's Enterprise spokesman Leo Varadkar said Ireland could not afford to have broadband which was 30 times slower than the service which is available in Japan. "In the modern economy, broadband is as important as roads and sewerage. Its a basic infrastructure, " he said.

The government is planning to invest 435m in its communication and broadband programme up to 2013. It says that with 700,000 broadband subscriptions progress is being made especially compared to other European Union member states.

However, McElligott described the European broadband league table as "nonsense".

"We 'celebrate' reaching the EU average. This is disingenuous. None of our neighbours (for example, the UK, Scandinavia, the Benelux countries and France) concern themselves with EU averages. They continue to roll out ever more sophisticated offerings, and plot their new generation networks of up to 100MB connectivity to the home. We claim the 4th highest per capita GDP on Earth. And we want to be average?"

Sponge Bob

Its impossible to embarass jobsworths like Ryan and Martin but McElligot never said that, the Tribune did.

It would be nice if he published an open letter instead of grubbing these missives into ministers who care less and understand nothing .

smellslikeshoes

This is the third article I have seen that he has ripped into the state of broadband in Ireland. Very nice to see someone in a position such as his making some noise.

Fabio

Good to see people kicking up a fuss over this. Bloody disgraceful broadband situation in this country...