Eircom Group and O2 announce mobile network sharing in Ireland.

Abelloid

That is all, just saw this on Twitter.

http://twitter.com/#!/StephenBeynon/

Max Power 2010

Telefonica O2 Ireland and eircom Group today announced a major new strategic partnership to create the first comprehensive mobile network sharing arrangement in Ireland.
The agreement aims to provide the best mobile network infrastructure in the country. This collaboration by two of Ireland’s leading telecommunications companies will result in an unrivalled mobile experience for customers. With growing demand for higher bandwidth services across Ireland, the partnership will facilitate the introduction of new technologies to provide customers with wider and faster broadband speeds. It is also fully aligned with the Government’s objective to provide next generation broadband to homes and businesses in Ireland.
The agreement brings greater co-operation in a number of areas of mobile network sharing such as site equipment, power supply, technology and transmission sharing. Wherever possible, existing sites of both operators will be consolidated and new sites will be jointly built. A dedicated team, made up of existing network staff from both organisations, will be established to manage the day-to-day build and operation of the distinct networks.
While O2 and eircom will work closely together, there is no transfer of assets and spectrum will not be shared under the new arrangement. All mobile operations supported by O2 (O2 and Tesco Mobile) and eircom Group (Meteor and eMobile) will continue to compete with each other, ensuring that customer choice in the market is maintained.
Delivering benefits to customers
By improving network efficiencies, both companies will be able to continue to invest in developing innovative products and services, ultimately enhancing competition in the retail markets. Customers of both companies can expect to benefit from long-term improvements in coverage, particularly for services such as mobile broadband.
Speaking on behalf of eircom Group, CEO Paul Donovan said, “It is imperative that our industry continues to invest in both fixed and mobile platforms to underpin Ireland’s national recovery. The current economic realities require all operators to think creatively on how to operate more efficiently. This new collaboration between two of the largest operators in the Irish market demonstrates how working together we can deliver tangible benefits for customers. ”
Stephen Shurrock, CEO of Telefonica O2 Ireland, said, “We continue to see strong demand from consumers and businesses alike for higher bandwidth services, as mobile data usage grows. Today’s announcement will enable us to not only deliver new and enhanced services, including faster broadband speeds, but also to do it in a much more efficient way, providing the best mobile infrastructure for the customer and the economy alike. There is a strong strategic requirement for greater collaboration and focus in the area of investment in helping to accelerate the introduction of new technologies and O2 is delighted to be at the forefront of this development”.
Network sharing initiatives are becoming the norm rather than the exception globally (with initiatives already implemented in a number of countries including the UK, Spain, France and the Czech Republic) facilitating investment in new technology and service enhancements; and meeting growing demand for higher bandwidth services.

Abelloid

http://www.siliconrepublic.com/comms/item/21269-eircom-and-o2-in-first-iris

robwen

so what does this mean exactly. I have an o2 mobile & eircom landline & broadband am i going to get any extra benefit here, perhaps better reception on my mobile phone at my home address??

Max Power 2010

It basically means 02/Tesco will share their Mobile Infrastructure with Meteor/Emobile, to provide better coverage and Mobile Broadband services.

I don't think this would benefit any Landline customers.

evolutionqy7

Pretty good news to 02 and meteor customers

Hopefully they won't raise prices for service.

bd250110

I think this is good news for the Irish consumer. It should have the effect of reducing costs of running the network, which will result in better coverage and may allow operators to reduce tariff costs.

This sounds like a different network to the Voda/3 set-up. Basically mast-towers and other network infrastructure will be shared, but there will still be two separate networks, that of o2 and that of Meteor.

evolutionqy7

Well I think they just realised that all networks are up to par the same coverage. Only way to improve is to raise more towers. Which takes a long time to do and costs alot of money. So if they join in. They can reduce investment costs and differenciate on pricing and offers. Though there had to be an agreement in pricing since meteors pricing is lower and that would outstand o2 if they won't turn more competitive

Max Power 2010

evolutionqy7 wrote: »

Well I think they just realised that all networks are up to par the same coverage. Only way to improve is to raise more towers. Which takes a long time to do and costs alot of money. So if they join in. They can reduce investment costs and differenciate on pricing and offers. Though there had to be an agreement in pricing since meteors pricing is lower and that would outstand o2 if they won't turn more competitive

Thats exactly it.

It will benefit Meteor as they will no longer have to pay Vodafone for National Roaming and they will gain substantial 2G & 3G coverage in the west.

It will reduce O2's infracture costs allowing them to become more competive in the market.

evolutionqy7

Though it will probably take a lot of time till they get this approved by ComReg and get all the terms and conditions sorted out.

jimmycrackcorm

bd250110 wrote: »

I think this is good news for the Irish consumer. It should have the effect of reducing costs of running the network, which will result in better coverage and may allow operators to make more profits.

FYP. Still better coverage for Meteor users

evolutionqy7

Well on the 3G part yes. Meteor has significantly faster broadband speeds but they lack in 3G coverage.

Regarding averege coverage its prety much up to par with O2. Meteor coverage isnt as bad as it was years ago. It has improved alot over the past couple of years.

jay93

Will this mean that where o2 have coverage and where meteor don't that i would be able to conenct over the o2 network ?if so then this is great news not that i have had any issues with meteor's coverage as of yet 3G is great in my area outside the area tough it goes to EDGE alot .

mooneyd

It looks like a big win to Meteor & eMobile customer's I don't see much of a gain for 02 customers apart from the 02 broadband customers where they may look at splitting the cell's and having call's going through the 2g cell's and focus the broadband through the 3g cell's.

byte

Weren't Vodafone and O2 supposed to do something similar together a few years ago?

I'm sure I read a article about it.

Kensington

jay93 wrote: »

Will this mean that where o2 have coverage and where meteor don't that i would be able to conenct over the o2 network ?if so then this is great news not that i have had any issues with meteor's coverage as of yet 3G is great in my area outside the area tough it goes to EDGE alot .

I don't think so.
There will still be two physical networks as I understand it - O2 and Eircom.
It just means if Meteor want to put a cell into an area where O2 already have a tower there, it'll simply be a matter of sticking their own panels up on O2's tower and connecting in to the existing power supply and backhaul present and vice versa.
Whereas before the agreement, Meteor would first have to apply for their own planning permission, hope they were approved, build their own tower, obtain their own ESB supply, backup power supply, network backhaul etc. Expensive and time consuming.

jesus_thats_gre

evolutionqy7 wrote: »

Hopefully they won't raise prices for service.

Whatever about your opinion of either company, Eircom in particular, the last thing that should happen as a result of this is increased prices.

jesus_thats_gre

mooneyd wrote: »

It looks like a big win to Meteor & eMobile customer's I don't see much of a gain for 02 customers apart from the 02 broadband customers where they may look at splitting the cell's and having call's going through the 2g cell's and focus the broadband through the 3g cell's.

From my understanding, it helps O2 quite a bit as they apparently struggle with backhaul to quite a high number sites. This seriously limits their ability to offer data products.

PogMoThoin

There is no sharing of spectrum, just sharing of masts

jesus_thats_gre

Probably sharing backhaul to those masts though.

cookie1977

byte wrote: »

Weren't Vodafone and O2 supposed to do something similar together a few years ago?

I'm sure I read a article about it.

Yes they did
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=59520910

Pete69

Hate to spoil anyones hopes for improved coverage, quality, or customer experience on either network, but this is just another exercise in cost cutting, by both operators. They are sharing infrastructure, principally towers, cabin's and power supply's. The cost saving's are obvious, reduced rent for the site, single cabin's, and in the future shared hardware in the form of base station node's, backhaul network infrasturcture, antenna system's and staffing levels. Currently all the hardware vendors are falling over themselves to produce viable LTE base station's that can support multiple networks or mixed 2G and 3G networks on a single platform. However neither the hardware vendor's or network operators are giving any real consideration to the single point of failure problems that they will face in the future. So in most cases you will not only lose one network but probably 2 and possibly 3 networks when a site goes down for any of the usual reasons, ESB supply failure, transmission nework failure or higher function failure on the BTS itself. Nor would I expect to see any real world savings being offered to customers on either network as a result of this.

KrisW

Pete69 wrote: »

Hate to spoil anyones hopes for improved coverage, quality, or customer experience on either network, but this is just another exercise in cost cutting, by both operators. They are sharing infrastructure, principally towers, cabin's and power supply's. The cost saving's are obvious, reduced rent for the site, single cabin's, and in the future shared hardware in the form of base station node's, backhaul network infrasturcture, antenna system's and staffing levels. Currently all the hardware vendors are falling over themselves to produce viable LTE base station's that can support multiple networks or mixed 2G and 3G networks on a single platform. However neither the hardware vendor's or network operators are giving any real consideration to the single point of failure problems that they will face in the future. So in most cases you will not only lose one network but probably 2 and possibly 3 networks when a site goes down for any of the usual reasons, ESB supply failure, transmission nework failure or higher function failure on the BTS itself. Nor would I expect to see any real world savings being offered to customers on either network as a result of this.

And the alternative, of both networks building their own parallel infrastructure, would benefit customers more?

Max Power 2010

Your bang on to a certain point.

My understanding is O2 benefit by using Meteors fibre optic backhaul and meteor benefit by expanding in the west (cut costs on handover fees to VF in National Roaming areas) and gain coverage in other remote areas without the planning permission,.ESB supply etc.


There is an awful lot customers can gain here regardless of competition, yes it is about cost just look at the state of eircom at the minute.

In regards service, outside built up areas all networks share towers (ESB, eircom, Garda tetra masts etc) so if there is a power failure in the area there all down anyway, there are diesel generators on 90% of sites anyway, the biggest issue with outages is weather and that you can't avoid with any outdoor network.

Pete69

KrisW wrote: »

And the alternative, of both networks building their own parallel infrastructure, would benefit customers more?

Your right it dosen't benefit the customer more. However that is the situation as it currently exists.

My point is, the network operators are not embarking on netshare deals in the interests of their customers, as it is highly unlikely they will pass on any savings they may make to their customers.

Pete69

Max Power 2010 wrote: »

In regards service, outside built up areas all networks share towers (ESB, eircom, Garda tetra masts etc) so if there is a power failure in the area there all down anyway, there are diesel generators on 90% of sites anyway, the biggest issue with outages is weather and that you can't avoid with any outdoor network.

Your right about the sharing of third party towers (ESB, RTE, etc.) however with respect of the power issues, the only sites with, on site genny's are the high impact transmission SDH and some PDH hub sites, about 2 to 3% of any the networks sites in total. There is battery backup systems on all sites, but these are in many cases long past their best. The batteries on many of these sites are over ten years old.

Also the operators are not taking into consideration the extra loading the additional equipment is placing on their existing backup systems.

On the plus side for netshare sites, if they do have to put temporary genny's onto a site, one genny will keep both networks up.

Pete69

Max Power 2010 wrote: »

My understanding is O2 benefit by using Meteors fibre optic backhaul.

O2 are currently changing out their entire PDH network and creating more hub sites into which fibre nodes from a variety of fibre provider's are being installed. However the backhaul issue really only applies to data 3G traffic at present. GSM 2G 900 still provides better coverage and greater air interface capacity than 3G. All 2G traffic is currently carried on E1 PDH traffic to SDH sites where it is presented to the core transmission network (SDH) and onward to the core switch network.