Broadband providers await Eircom's MRD

damien

http://www.siliconrepublic.com/news/news.nv?storyid=single5571

The end may be in sight for a long-running dispute over local loop unbundling (LLU) between incumbent Eircom and the Commission for Communications Regulation (ComReg) when Eircom delivers its much-anticipated market requirements document (MRD) on Monday to the regulator plus LLU access seekers BT, Smart Telecom and Magnet.
LLU refers to the process by which the last mile of Eircom’s copper network into homes and businesses is opened up for use by competitors. It is seen in many countries as a vital means of increasing the spread of DSL broadband. Effectively it governs licensed operators placing their equipment on Eircom exchanges.

Industry insiders say that if the MRD is progressive, in the sense that both Eircom and the industry find common ground that they can work on, Irish homes and businesses could soon enjoy broadband speeds of up to 24Mbps as consumed in some European countries today because innovation and investment would flourish.

Eircom’s decision to issue the MRD to ComReg and the various LLU access seekers stems from its defeat of ComReg in a High Court action in August. The High Court held ComReg could not use an enforcement order to compel Eircom to implement the decision in January around LLU that Eircom was in the process of appealing to an appeal panel.

In a form of settlement following the case, Eircom told ComReg that it will issue an MRD on 24 October.

...

The Bollox

will we get this automatically if we are using Eircom BB or will we have to go for another package?

Saruman

This is about Eircoms competition more so. Like smart. So it will not benefit Eircom customers. then again i could be wrong..

dahamsta

Marts wrote:

will we get this automatically if we are using Eircom BB or will we have to go for another package?

Google for "local loop unbundling" to figure out what it means Marts.

JohnC.

What's that you say? Eircoms MeRDe?

cgarvey

How long before we (the public), or OLOs find out about the implications therein?

.cg

damien

OLOs and ComReg were meant to get the docs tonight.

eircomtribunal

There was a report on the issue in the business part of rte 5-7 live tonight. Mike Maloney of BT was interviewed. He said that currently not over 80% as Eircom claims can get dsl, but merely 60% to 65 %.

Is that part available on the RTE website, I wonder?

P

parasite

http://www.rte.ie/business/2005/1024/businesstonight.html

Maskhadov

Will Eircon carry out the LLU now ? or will the court battle continue ?

damien

eircom response to ComReg Market Requirements

Document on Local Loop Unbundling (LLU)

Issued 25 October 2005. eircom has responded to ComReg and the access seekers
regarding their requests through the market requirements document (MRD) for
new forms of LLU access. eircom has requested that ComReg convene an industry
forum to define and agree the appropriate mechanisms for a product known as
LLU/GNP (geographic number portability). eircom's analysis shows that the
systems development to deliver a product specifically as requested would take
18 months following industry agreement and would cost €13m. The underlying
IT developments were proposed by eircom as part of the LLU product in 2001,
but were rejected at that time as unnecessary by the Regulator and industry.

eircom believes that there is currently no case for a migration process as
proposed in the MRD. Further, eircom has proposed that ComReg should conduct
a full market analysis, consultation and regulatory impact assessment before
considering any further actions.

eircom looks forward to working with the industry and ComReg to ensure that
customers can benefit from further access eircom's network.

crawler

Sadly - more or less exactly what I expected

cgarvey

I thought there'd be some token half-assed effort, but alas

machalla

They must be a prime case study in how to maintain a monopoly successfully.
Well we were only 14th out of 15 on that recent study. Next year lets go for number 15!

crawler

cgarvey wrote:

I thought there'd be some token half-assed effort, but alas

Initially, what I thought also but after the recent court case win etc I got the feeling it was doomed....they were priming the market for this recently too...

Sponge Bob

The 'margin squeeze' directive from Comreg has gone up the swannee too , Bitstream operators will not have a great time in the absence of LLU either. !

Praetorian

Nice delay tactic there by eircom. I'm sure they'll do their best to keep us from the benefits of LLU for as long as they can; 18-24 months wouldn't surprise me with our weak submissive regulator.

eircomtribunal

Eircom seem to be very confident that both the DCMNR and the ComReg are incompetent and impotent entities.

Why else would they not head the citigroup advice to them:

Despite winning the regulatory battles, eircom could still lose the war.

eircom appears to be using all the loop-holes at its disposal to frustrate the definition of a workable ULL process. It would be easy to conclude that this is simply an attempt to delay for as long as possible before the floodgates eventually burst. However, in our view eircom is actually playing a clever game to enhance its negotiating/bargaining position. Ultimately, the company must know that the processes behind ULL will be defined – there appears to be too much commercial pressure all around for this not to be the case. We believe that eircom’s objective is to ensure that the economic model and the time frame for full adoption are as favourable as possible from its perspective.
The danger is that eircom pushes too aggressively and that the political masters lose patience. The endgame for all stakeholders in the Irish market must be a portfolio of linked wholesale products.

We saw Minister Noel Dempsey already dangerously loosing his patience and pleading on the airwaves that Eircom should now act in the common interest...

P.

Blaster99

Is he likely to do anything more substantial than plead?

lucernarian

I cannot imagine Noel Dempsey being able to arm-wrestle Eircom into a more co-operative attitude. Dermot Ahern, a capable minister, couldn't force too much out of them. And all it really amounted to was a poor-value FRIACO directive.

I'm suprised that the government have not considered throwing money at Eircom to get the job done - the availability problem is giving the Govt flak from a number of directions like IOFFL, IBEC, the competing teleco's, advisory bodies and from private individuals in high places. Let us not forget that Dermot got his own exchange enabled in Blackrock (Co. Louth). Mabye they have, but perhaps nothing will happen until closer to election time.

As for Eircom, I'm not suprised... Must their MRD be accepted? I don't see why there should be such conflicting ideas between Eircom and the OLOs. Either it works or it doesn't:mad:

Sponge Bob

Blaster99 wrote:

Is he likely to do anything more substantial than plead?

Maybe. Noel has aproblem (see my sig ) and may have to quickly push a general Comms Bill before the Dáil in order to protect the futre and the operational integrity of our Postal service .

I would add some provisions to this bill to ensure that Ireland actually reaches the stated and essentially vapourificatious Dempsey target of (500k connections end 2006 was it) and if that is not likely to be reached an immediate review of Eircom will start end 2006 latest with a view to breaking the monopoly up.

This really means the review can start as soon as the Act becomes law, about March or April. As for Comreg I would formally and finally abolish it in March / April when bill becomes an Act as an institutional failure. Thats how useless and futile Comreg is

Then restablish its sucessor as an arm of the Competition Authority and hire some of the more ept members as regulatory droids , frankly most can go rot or get useful jobs in Spar and Centra . Not having any 'Comreg' for 6 months would be no worse than 6 months of pain watching them do nothing and complain endlessly about their doing (or not) of the nothing ...as usual.

Pushing for a Comms Act to do the above may be an interesting policy plank for the IofffL committee

Mr_Man

This would be an ideal time for the DCMNR and Comreg to get to-gether and really put it up to Eircom. The Department should put all telecoms contracts coming up for renewal out to tender and inlcude conditions which promote competition in the Irish market.

Comreg should ask for the ECAP hearing to be accelerated, if possible, and in the meanime work with the Department to draft regulations which will give it the teeth necessary to do a prpoer job. If necessary some heavy hitters should be drafted in to give the body the spine it is so obiviously lacking.

I say this is unlikely because with an election coming up in the near future the politicos are unlikely to risk antagonising Sir Anto in case "the editors" who brought us the hatchet job on Liam Lawlors family decide to go after them.

Geldof got it right when he wrote

'banana republic septic isle'

So fcuking depressing.........:(

M.

dahamsta

Mr_Man wrote:

I say this is unlikely because with an election coming up in the near future the politicos are unlikely to risk antagonising Sir Anto in case "the editors" who brought us the hatchet job on Liam Lawlors family decide to go after them.

Not so much "Sir" Anto imho, more being seen to be lefty (not Bertie's rather queer definition, mind). If they give regulators teeth or do anything else even remotely anti-corporate (or pro-government, obviously), they're lefties, and their corporate sponsors won't like that.

The only option open to them is to throw money at Eircom, and obviously they can't do that either. So essentially they're in a holding pattern.

Nothing's going to happen unless they get a Push, capital P. A Big Push, capital B, capital P. Corporations will push, but not hard enough, because the only solutions are - you guessed it - anti-corporate and pro-government. Which leaves...

adam

Sponge Bob

Abolishing Comreg will not piss anyone off , its beautiful

damien

And remove the DCMNR's shield? More chance of Bertie and John Bruton putting on some Barry White, dimming the lights, breaking open a carton of red wine-like alcoholic beverage and ...

scojones

This country sickens me sometimes

dahamsta

Damien's post sickened me. Major nausea.

Sponge Bob

The only bit of Comreg the DCMNR actually wants ( think CA$H€€$H people ) is spectrum licencing .

jwt

Found this while searching for LLU refernces

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=81541


That was july 2001!!!!

John

OfflerCrocGod

jwt wrote:

That was july 2001!!!!

There was no demand.

viking

Eircom's rivals criticise plans for network access
Barry O'Halloran

Eircom's competitors yesterday said its proposals for allowing access to its network did not go far enough and accused it of hindering the development of broadband services in the Republic.

The company has given a report to communications regulator, ComReg, and to its competitors detailing how it intends to open up access to the lines connecting its exchanges with consumers and businesses.

Opening up this link, known as the last mile or the local loop, would allow its competitors to connect their own equipment to customers, and offer them their own services. Currently they rent Eircom lines at wholesale rates.

Eircom has agreed to tackle one issue raised by competitors. This is allowing customers who switch from its service to a competitor's local loop product to keep their number. But it says this will take 18 months and will cost €13 million and warns that it will not carry this cost itself.

Another key issue for competitors is allowing customers using their wholesale services to switch to a local loop-based product without a break in service. Eircom is refusing to facilitate this.

Reacting to an Eircom statement detailing the proposals, BT chief executive for Ireland, Scotland and Wales, Danny McLoughlin said the company's stance would damage the Republic's competitiveness.

"The Eircom press release is very disappointing news for customers, for the development of innovative services and for the extension of choice through competitiveness," he said.

Chairman of consumer lobby group, Ireland Offline, Damien Mulley, argued that access to the last mile was key to the development of broadband. The Republic's low level of broadband availability is damaging its ability to attract multi-national investment.

"Ireland will never recover in the broadband stakes if this attitude is left to prevail," he said. "We feel now that only direct ministerial intervention can resolve this issue."

However, Eircom's commercial director, David McRedmond, said last night that the issue of broadband availability was not connected to access to the local loop.

Eircom's report says that facilitating the switch from wholesale to local loop-based products will simply aggravate the digital divide by allowing its competitors to invest most in profitable urban areas.

Mr McRedmond claimed that this could create a situation where Eircom would be forced to invest in equipment to allow competitors to sell wholesale products, which they could then bypass once they have recruited enough customers to make local loop-based services viable.

This would leave the company with large amounts of redundant equipment in its exchanges, he said.

© The Irish Times

viking

Mr McRedmond claimed that this could create a situation where Eircom would be forced to invest in equipment to allow competitors to sell wholesale products, which they could then bypass once they have recruited enough customers to make local loop-based services viable.

There it is, thats the real fear for eircom. They know this will happen once competitors can unbundle the local loop and start offering innovative products to consumers. A major loss of revenue for eircom if wholesale customers suddenly become LLU customers.

Stifle progress at all costs...

Blaster99

Isn't McRedmond implicitly acknowledging that Eircom's products are poor? He's predicting that once there's an alternative, everyone will leave Eircom. If Eircom had decent competitive services, they wouldn't run the risk of having exchanges full of redundant equipment.

machalla

A competitive monopoly? I can't honestly think of any examples of that in this country. Why would Eircon want to be any different from the rest.

crawler

Sponge Bob wrote:

Abolishing Comreg will not piss anyone off , its beautiful

Noel D said as much at the Comreg CEO forum!

cgarvey

IoffL press release now online.

damien

http://www.enn.ie/frontpage/news-9650669.html

eircomtribunal

damien.m wrote:

http://www.enn.ie/frontpage/news-9650669.html

Quote from the enn article:

For its part, Eircom says that there is no link between LLU and broadband penetration rates. It says that only 0.2 percent of lines in Belgium are unbundled, even though the country has 54 percent broadband penetration. It also said that only 1 percent of lines in Sweden are unbundled, even though it has 25 percent broadband penetration.

Is any dog****e eircom places on the pavement good enough to be cited?

Belgium has a high broadband penetration of 17% (% is the way the EC and ECTA express the more correct OECD "connections per 100 inhabitants" definition of broadband penetration), not 54% and only 1% is through unbundled lines. So Belgium is an exception.(Basically in Belgium's case their extremely high cable availability provided for competitive DSL provision) That does in no way take away from the general argument.

Sweden has high broadband penetration of 17% and very high usage of LLU: 29% of DSL connections are provided over unbundled lines.
(The professional Eircom liars misread the ECTA tables and slipped to the UK rate of only 1% of unbundled DSL provision. The UK is the other big exception, but looking closer at its circumstances would explain exactly how that came about.)
Anybody to point that Eircom misinformation out to Ciaran Buckley?
P.

paulm17781

The sad thing here is it seems that only the cable companies will be able to truely save us for the interim. Let us just hope upc do here what they have done in other countries.

eircomtribunal

paulm17781 wrote:

The sad thing here is it seems that only the cable companies will be able to truely save us for the interim. Let us just hope upc do here what they have done in other countries.

Cable footprint simply is too small in Ireland.

LLU has to be the big puzzle piece.
Another thing with comparing other countries LLU figures: It is not necessarily the absolute high percentage of DSL delivered over unbundled lines that counts. The competitive threat of LLU being really available is often sufficient to push the incumbent to provide decent broadband.
It will be interesting how the UK situation will develop in this regard.

P.

crawler

What are the odds that eircom will up DSL speeds witihn the coming couple of weeks to show what good guys they are?

Good in itself, I know but....

paulm17781

eircomtribunal wrote:

Cable footprint simply is too small in Ireland.

LLU has to be the big puzzle piece.

While I am in complete agreement with this. If/when NTL & Chorus are merged, that will give about 500,000(?) wired cable homes to one company? That could put a dent in Eircom's business.

500,000 is a guess. Correct me if I am wrong.

crawler

paulm17781 wrote:

While I am in complete agreement with this. If/when NTL & Chorus are merged, that will give about 500,000(?) wired cable homes to one company? That could put a dent in Eircom's business.

500,000 is a guess. Correct me if I am wrong.

NTL would have that many passed homes alone on cable....if all was 2 way.

Dont know about Chorus....check last Company listing/filing...

eircomtribunal

crawler wrote:

NTL would have that many passed homes alone on cable....if all was 2 way.

Dont know about Chorus....check last Company listing/filing...

To my knowledge Ireland has currently below 200 000 cable connections which can deliver broadband.
That is not enough to seriously tickle eircom.

Sure, cable will expand, but it is a slow and costly process, while Eircom can wait to the last minute and longer ("incumbent effect"), before it upgrades with the press of a switch.

I would have my doubts that eircom really feels the cable competition even in the areas where NTL broadband is taken up by 10% of connections.
P.

Blaster99

I wouldn't be surprised if Eircom is rolling out broadband quicker than NTL. If true this is pretty diabolical considering NTL is all in urban areas.

I'd say IBB has a greater footprint than NTL. Irrelevant I know. Maybe Digiweb will get there with the Metro stuff?

philologos

Magnet.ie are saying that they will have 10Mbit soon

damien

It seems that our figures via ECTA and the figures eircom are pulling out of their .. "book of facts" are not matching in any shape or form and many journalists are unable to figure out which set of figures are the right ones.

Would the readers here care to point out additional sources of LLU numbers which we can use to strengthen our argument?

Thanks.

seamus

I think the fact that if you search for "LLU statistics in Western Europe" on Google and fine absolutely no reports on LLU in Ireland (and identical reports on LLU in other countries) speaks volumes.

Blaster99

I'm working on the Swedish numbers, prelimary results indicate that your numbers are correct. I will try the Danish regulator too. The Finnish regulator possibly publishes in Swedish too (official language in Finland), but I can't find the URL of the regulator. Anyone know what it is? If I have those countries covered, that leaves Holland and France.

Sounds like eircom are on thin ice. Let's get them.

parasite

it was discussed on 5-7 live, see here http://www.rte.ie/business/2005/1026/businesstonight.html

OfflerCrocGod

"Minister Noel Dempsey says we need LLU not just for national interests but also to ensure eircom employees have a secure future." Umm impatience?