NBP: National Broadband Plan Announced

Johnboy1951

legocrazy505 wrote: »

Well there's no threat now until 2017. They'll still carry on but I'd say places who thought they would be seeing some improvement this year may have to wait even longer. Eir are the only fixed line provider doing anything in rural areas so they can kick back.

more likely to press ahead so that the 300k are excluded from the NBP ...... which would give them a huge advantage tendering for the rest, as they would have fibre routes already out a bit, and proved they were capable of doing it.

They have more to gain (monopoly?) by doing as many as they can before NBP is finalised.

legocrazy505

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

more likely to press ahead so that the 300k are excluded from the NBP ...... which would give them a huge advantage tendering for the rest, as they would have fibre routes already out a bit, and proved they were capable of doing it.

They have more to gain (monopoly?) by doing as many as they can before NBP is finalised.

Eir already had this advantage by being the ex-state owned infrastructure (selling it was just a stupid ignorance to technology in my opinion). They don't need to do all 300,000 to prove they can do what we already know they could do for years but just couldn't be bothered to do. Siro if anything is the other big group who needs to prove their worth and honestly right now compared to Eir, I'm not really seeing it. Eir's advancement just seems to be relentless, imagine if they had the NBP tender already....

Varik

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

more likely to press ahead so that the 300k are excluded from the NBP ...... which would give them a huge advantage tendering for the rest, as they would have fibre routes already out a bit, and proved they were capable of doing it.

They have more to gain (monopoly?) by doing as many as they can before NBP is finalised.

Not the smart thing or the good thing to be saying but I hope Eir monopolize the **** out this.

daraghwal

Varik wrote: »

Not the smart thing or the good thing to be saying but I hope Eir monopolize the **** out this.

At least they don't have to have 20 f**king task forces to do it.. they actually get it done.

marno21

Eir are doing the 300,000 most commercially viable premises of the NBP homes, mainly villages and ribbon developments along main routes. One off houses in the middle of nowhere won't be part of the 300k

daraghwal

marno21 wrote: »

Eir are doing the 300,000 most commercially viable premises of the NBP homes, mainly villages and ribbon developments along main routes. One off houses in the middle of nowhere won't be part of the 300k

Obviously eir trying to make the NBP less attractive for the other companies. Is it possible for these companies e.g. imagine to withdraw from the bidding for the NBP if eir do so much that it is not worthwhile for them or any other bidder going for it?

Johnboy1951

daraghwal wrote: »

As eir are now making the NBP less attractive for the other companies, is it possible for these companies e.g. imagine to withdraw from the bidding for the NBP?

of course ..... nobody has committed to anything as yet

daraghwal

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

of course ..... nobody has committed to anything as yet

I'd actually like to see that happening because things would probably get done so much quicker!!

plodder

daraghwal wrote: »

Obviously eir trying to make the NBP less attractive for the other companies. Is it possible for these companies e.g. imagine to withdraw from the bidding for the NBP if eir do so much that it is not worthwhile for them or any other bidder going for it?

I don't think it's quite that bad. Looking at my own area (and some others) the blue lines are kind of arbitrary and it's not like there is a particularly high density of properties on the lines, which drops dramatically off then. I don't see why the economics of supplying service to much of the rest of the country shouldn't be similar to Eir's FTTH service. That might depend on getting access to Eir's unused fibre though. And of course, the final 10% and 5% is where the real problems and expense is going to be.

tsue921i8wljb3

Escalation! Eir now willing to sign binding agreement to deliver fibre broadband to the 300000 premises previously announced. No date mentioned for completion though.

http://www.irishexaminer.com/business/eir-open-to-giving-broadband-commitment-to-300000-homes-and-businesses-400390.html

daraghwal

Siena Gigantic Backyard wrote: »

Escalation! Eir now willing to sign binding agreement to deliver fibre broadband to the 300000 premises previously announced. No date mentioned for completion though.

http://www.irishexaminer.com/business/eir-open-to-giving-broadband-commitment-to-300000-homes-and-businesses-400390.html

Yaaaasssss

Johnboy1951

Siena Gigantic Backyard wrote: »

Escalation! Eir now willing to sign binding agreement to deliver fibre broadband to the 300000 premises previously announced. No date mentioned for completion though.

http://www.irishexaminer.com/business/eir-open-to-giving-broadband-commitment-to-300000-homes-and-businesses-400390.html

It seems eir were getting worried that their previous talks with civil servants might be forgotten if the staff did not transfer to the newly responsible department.
They don't seem to know who they should contact so this should force some communications from the relevant department on the matter.

Next up ..... Imagine offer to commit to providing minimum or above service to various areas (using FWA), and so take out some more premises from the NBP? ..... great in the short term but probably the nightmare scenario for a lot of rural dwellers!

xxyyzz

Does imagine's new offering give customers any extra speed over bog standard wireless rural broadband schemes? Or is LTE a totally different technology to wireless?

wexfordman2

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

It seems eir were getting worried that their previous talks with civil servants might be forgotten if the staff did not transfer to the newly responsible department.
They don't seem to know who they should contact so this should force some communications from the relevant department on the matter.

Next up ..... Imagine offer to commit to providing minimum or above service to various areas (using FWA), and so take out some more premises from the NBP? ..... great in the short term but probably the nightmare scenario for a lot of rural dwellers!

But imagine are not providing an equivalent service to what the nbp may deliver.

Eircom are away ng they will commit to delivering a product which is future proof and meets all the criteria

rodge123

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

It seems eir were getting worried that their previous talks with civil servants might be forgotten if the staff did not transfer to the newly responsible department.
They don't seem to know who they should contact so this should force some communications from the relevant department on the matter.

Next up ..... Imagine offer to commit to providing minimum or above service to various areas (using FWA), and so take out some more premises from the NBP? ..... great in the short term but probably the nightmare scenario for a lot of rural dwellers!

Nightmare scenario is right!
I purposely have not put my address into Imagine's coverage checker for fear they might see a few people enquiring from the area and decide to service us! I'm in meath and not a million miles from areas they claim to have covered in Kildare.

I'll go without quality speeds for a few more years if it means getting a future proofed FTTH connection from NBP.

I can see the whole situation turing into the Luas lines fiasasco again...i.e. not linking the lines up initially and costing way more years later. In this case....load of people excluded from NBP because Imagine hover them up initially and then dont bother to upgrade their network adequately over the following years
I see a lot of their tests only manage 3Mb or 4Mb up.

chris_ie

xxyyzz wrote: »

Does imagine's new offering give customers any extra speed over bog standard wireless rural broadband schemes? Or is LTE a totally different technology to wireless?

Going by reports of customers that have Imagine LTE, they offer a much better service. I'm on an "up to 50MB" FWA connection. 3 years ago you'd get around 10MB in evenings. Now its nearly 0.5-1.5MB.

In saying that, some on here have report that Imagine have been dropping below their minimum 30MB promise, so will be interesting to see if its a tech glitch or oversubscribing already. Either way, its great for short term, but no one would want that as a long term fix.

I'm on the Eir "blue line" so I'd be happy for Eir to sign a commitment, as long as they dont revise their plan and I'm removed

Surely the removal of those 300k from the NBP will be less attractive to other bidders.

Q: Is there any minimum upload spec in the NBP?

KOR101

Are Eir essentially saying that they could live with losing the 350k remaining NBP to a competitor? On their own, there probably isn't much of a commercial case to be made for them, even with the subsidies. But, the problem for Eir is that if another company has to bring fibre into those rural areas, the chances of them offering fibre in the more commercial areas along the way is much more likely.

Unless they are fairly sure they will win one of the two contracts, and can live with losing just one area.

Or, maybe they are trying to be clever, and kicking the NBP while it is down. The best outcome for them is if the plan gets lost in the current confusion.

Johnboy1951

Bear in mind that the minimum specs for EU funding for the NBP is 30/6 IIRC.
So obviously Imagine are targeting this with their 30Mb/s offering.
I expect there to be some variations in Imagines connections as they try to find the balance between the number of users on a mast and maintaining the minimum service required.

I have no information on what they intend to do about upload speed ...... does anyone have such info?

With the reduction in numbers in NBP the EU funding will drop, and also the cost per premise served will increase as they will be more remote.

So it might be possible for the government contribution for the NBP to remain similar to what was estimated, just spread across less connections.

Nonetheless there is a grave danger, if eir do not win the complete package, that different technologies might be used in different circumstances.
I have lost confidence in SIRO gaining any traction, so my hope is on eir presently.

ED E

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

I have no information on what they intend to do about upload speed ...... does anyone have such info?

In an FDD deployment (regular 4G across the country) you download on freq 1 and upload on freq 2 (which may be a few bands away). There its common to see 30-40Mb up as US tends to be less busy than DS. My personal best is 48Mb on CAT4 FDD.

With TDD its more like traditional wifi, everything in one band. Everyone takes a turn like walkey-talkies, if two speak together they collide and nothing gets through. From my understanding Imagine have the ability to allocate as many or as few timeslots to upstream as they like, the problem being more up means less down. If they're already close to/below the 30Mb threshold then they'll have to increase overall capacity before they can increase the upstream allocation.

marno21

Several questions asked to and answered by Dennis Naughten this week relating to the NBP:

https://www.kildarestreet.com/wrans/?id=2016-05-17a.3060

tsue921i8wljb3

marno21 wrote: »

Several questions asked to and answered by Dennis Naughten this week relating to the NBP:

https://www.kildarestreet.com/wrans/?id=2016-05-17a.3060

The same answer to each question with not much said that had not been said already.

daraghwal

Siena Gigantic Backyard wrote: »

The same answer to each question with not much said that had not been said already.

Really nothing new there There probably won't be any more news until they set up those task forces that we all know work so well...

I'd like to see what they say to eir signing a contract for the 300,000 homes though!

KOR101

daraghwal wrote: »

Really nothing new there

Great news, in fact.

The plan stays with the Department of Communications for now, and it is only at rollout stage that the new Ministry for Rural Affairs gets involved. The bidders have already said that they faced problems at the planning/local authority level, so there are useful things to be done by those taskforces.

daraghwal

KOR101 wrote: »

Great news, in fact.

The plan stays with the Department of Communications for now, and it is only at rollout stage that the new Ministry for Rural Affairs gets involved. The bidders have already said that they faced problems at the planning/local authority level, so there are useful things to be done by those taskforces.

You have a good point. I don't mind that they have task forces and they do a lot of work but I think the problem is over the years they seem to disappear...

KOR101

http://www.breakingnews.ie/business/eir-boss-says-broadband-roll-out-can-happen-faster-than-government-plan-736314.html

legocrazy505

KOR101 wrote: »

http://www.breakingnews.ie/business/eir-boss-says-broadband-roll-out-can-happen-faster-than-government-plan-736314.html

Excellent news....if true. Hopefully the government take the hint and tender the contract as soon as possible to help speed up the process.

ED E

Pointless if they can't finish the tendering process before eir hit 300k commercials which seems increasingly likely. All momentum will be lost if the contractors finish up and are shed.

Gonzo

ED E wrote: »

Pointless if they can't finish the tendering process before eir hit 300k commercials which seems increasingly likely. All momentum will be lost if the contractors finish up and are shed.

I'd say once the 300,000 homes are complete Eir will also start FTTH in alot more urban locations in large villages, towns and cities keeping those jobs. By 2020 FTTC may be starting to get a bit slow compared to FTTH and Virgin Media.

KOR101

There has been a fair bit of good news in the last few days.

The plan 'appears' to be still on track, and with the Department of communications.

The shortlist will be decided next month. So, there will be a year to deal with any complaints from those not included -presumably Imagine, for one. Better to get that out of the way as soon as possible.

Eir say they will sign commitment contact for 300K premises. They have effectively started the original NBP 750k already. To get 300k of these out the way by end 2018 is really great news.

With the NBP down to 450k premises, meeting an earlier deadline than 2022 may well possible, but that would assume one of the contracts is not given to Eir.

A good week, but this was only ever going to be one hell of an obstacle course.

oscarBravo

legocrazy505 wrote: »

Hopefully the government take the hint and tender the contract as soon as possible...

Sure - but it's astonishing how soon people seem to think that is. This is one of the biggest infrastructure projects in the history of the state, and people - most of whom, with the greatest of respect, I'd venture to say haven't the faintest idea what's involved in the tendering process for a large state-aided project - seem to think the government could just sign a contract for it in the morning.