No faster 3G services for Ireland

Sponge Bob

Long long story but Comreg are going to do nothing about the 3G expansion bands in the next 2 years , they call this a strategy and you can read the strategy here if you fancy .

In order to get a lot faster 3g than we have now we need more ( and different ) spectrum for the 3G LTE air interface which is standardised this year and Comreg probably need to open up the 2.6ghz band ( between 2.5ghz and 2.69Ghz) sooner rather than later .

This is messy because MMDS is in there until 2014 using half of it .

Comreg intend to 'consult' on the issue in 2 years meaning nothing usable for 3 years . In the meantime it will likely not be feasible to deploy seriously fast HSDPA and HSUPA in Ireland owing to a lack of spectrum before 2011 .

We will get stuck on about 10mbits 3g from late this year onwards. To go faster would require chucking all the Huawei 220 devices off for technical reasons.

The issue becomes critical when it is noted that 900mhz GSM licences expire in 2011 and 1800mhz GSM licences in 2013/2014 ....so in three years or so a lot of mobile coverage will disappear because 900mhz penetrates much better than 1800mhz .

The UK will recycle 900mhz for 3g to improve penetration of buildings and 3g range , Ireland will simply shut it down . Some ****ing strategy what ???

I am amazed that any so called strategy has no proposals on this expansion band or the 900mhz band ( even if only in rural areas for the mid term) but hey....What Have Comreg Ever Done for Us ??? Eh ??!!

Of course Comreg know that little Huawei 3G modems capable of transmitting on those higher frequencies are most likely imminent during their strategy 'window' ...particularly 3g LTE devices

Overview of the band and its potential uses .

http://www.techworld.com/mobility/features/index.cfm?featureid=1654

rc28

I hate Comreg- it's as if their sole aim is to stop Ireland's broadband from improving
*rant over*

Seriously though, why aren't they willing to "consult" on the subject at all??

Sponge Bob

2 subjects , 900mhz and 2.6Ghz

They never even indicated that they were minded to co-ordinate with the UK on the border. Country people along the border will at least have O2 and Vodafone ( UK that is) providing a mobile service on 3G phones after 2011 where our network cannot .

As for 2.6Ghz co-ordination ????? They can pick up MMDS signals in feckin Liverpool .

In fact The Only Known Published map of MMDS coverage in Ireland is provided by Ofcom , here page 41 onwards , picture extracted for emphasis.

I can only surmise that Comreg hope UPC win the commercial DTT licence in the Autumn and will kindly migrate MMDS customers to DTT and then turn it off .

Meanwhile, from that link

Based upon data for the example Comreg MMDS network modelled, Ofcom concludes that
there will be significant interference to UK networks deployed in the award bands in western
mainland UK, and particularly in Northern Ireland where under the current scenario it would
be very difficult to deploy a network because of severe interference caused by the Irish
MMDS. Negotiation with the Irish Administration will be required to determine mitigation
measures and/or co-ordination procedures to reduce the interference effects.

Nothing in the Comreg strategy that even hints at co-ordination .

The Comreg 'strategy' of doing **** all good for anyone lives on .

watty

You need about 6 to 10 2.1GHz 3G bases to replace each 900MHz GSM base in Rural areas. In some areas even that will not give same coverage. 3G/HSDPA may be less than 65% Geography, 85% population.



Maybe Comreg plans to renew the GSM licences.

gerryo

watty wrote: »

Maybe Comreg plans to renew the GSM licences.

That's the sensibile option, but given the track record, what are the chances?

gerryo

Sponge Bob wrote: »

I can only surmise that Comreg hope UPC win the commercial DTT licence in the Autumn and will kindly migrate MMDS customers to DTT and then turn it off .

UPC need to win a DTT licence, DTT + Freesat will eat into their MMDS customer base.

Sponge Bob

gerryo wrote: »

That's the sensibile option, but given the track record, what are the chances?

Comreg have never done anything for rural Ireland, all their coverage targets and metrices obsess about population coverage not geographic coverage .

Comreg bleat about 70% coverage for this and that wireless service while knowing it means 30% geographic coverage .

Remember when Comreg decided 3 had "Significant Market Power" before 3 even had any customers .

The 3 Appeal.

This appeal arose out of a decision by ComReg that all four licensed mobile operators enjoyed significant market power (SMP) in respect of call termination on their own respective mobile networks. Only 3 appealed the decision. The parties agreed that the relevant market was the market for call termination on 3’s own network.



Call termination refers to the fact that when subscribers to other networks wish to call a subscriber to another mobile network, that operator must grant the other operators the right to terminate the call on its network. By definition 3 had a 100% share of the market for call termination on its own network.


( they had no customers at this point either SB)



3 argued that ComReg failed to take account of the fact that other parties, notably Eircom, enjoyed a degree of countervailing buyer power in negotiating rates for terminating calls on its network and that, as a result, it did not have a dominant position.







The ECAP found that ComReg erred in “assuming that market share gave the Appellant significant market power” and had failed to properly analyse whether or not Eircom and other parties had countervailing buyer power, which would prevent 3 from being dominant. It stated:


“In the Panel’s view this analysis is not sufficient. It does not meet the standard required of a regulator and does not sufficiently explore and analyse the possibility that interconnected parties and in particular, eircom, might have sufficient countervailing buyer power.

There is no evidence of a “thorough” analysis as required by paragraph 78 of the SMP Guidelines and, as was highlighted in section 6, there is a striking absence of analysis in relation to key areas, areas that the Respondent has now accepted to be of relevance.” (Para 8.9.)

The same shower came up with this cack handed strategy document .