KOR101 wrote: » The committment contract criteria were drawn up by Price Waterhouse well in advance of EIR agreeing to sign. They were published and initially just brushed aside by EIR who said they had sent their plans to the Department. It was only when the government refused to change the intervention map that EIR eventually signed up. The criteria reflect EU policy and you only have to look at what @clohamon posted about the Greek NBP to see that the EU are fully behind a fibre solution....the Gigabit Communication sets out further targets in order to respond to technological developments and future needs: by 2025 all European households, rural or urban,should have access to broadband networks offering a download speed of at least 100 Mbps, which can be upgraded to 1 Gbps, and socio-economic drivers should have access to speeds up to 1 Gbps symmetric. Hard to see the WISPs getting a look-in there. But, I guess there does have to be some point to these submissions.https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=111237551&postcount=415
Fergal Mulligan wrote: Mr. Neary and I, along with many others, are intimately familiar with the agreement pertaining to the 300,000 homes. We bear the scars of about nine months of lawyer-to-lawyer engagement with Eircom in getting that agreement. It was a difficult agreement to get. While we got criticism at the time, we were quite proud of getting it because at the start Eircom, fundamentally objected to a commitment to connect people.
Marlow wrote: » The big issue is, that the proposed contract so far is so full of irregularities, backhanders and issues that would void it, that the 3bn investment is massively challenged. Especially when it has been proven that the targets can be met at a fraction of the budget. Even technically. The whole issue is, that everyone is set on fibre. But that was never the actual target. The target was 30 Mbit/s now and 100 Mbit/s by 2025. Anyone expecting more is dreaming. Of course FTTH would be nice. But at what cost to the tax payer when the takeup effectively is 10% or less. Especially the clause of the government paying compensation for lack of takeup is ludicrous. /M
allanpkr wrote: » Obviously marlow you have broadband but not ftth ,sounds like sourgrapes .as your whole diatribe of lies is another attempt by your type to cloud what is obvious. Or do you work for that con company touting so called broadband i IMAGINE.
Orebro wrote: » This has to be one of the most comprehensive projects undertaken since rural electrification and has been under a microscope for months/years.
allanpkr wrote: » This plan was about future proofing ireland in communication. You say you only need 100....very short sighted whedn in the future iot will be massive and will need broadband that at the moment only ftth tech can provide. 3 billion is cheap, co pared to redoing it again in future cause it doesngt meet future needs and will cost many billions more. This isnt about you or i, its about future ireland. When intenational companys can set up i ireland knowing they will get top standard internet.then pay corporation tax , employees paying income tax............etc etc
allanpkr wrote: » You seem to have an agenda , with your one sided comments.
Emmanuel Lemon Louse wrote: » Contract to be signed by "the end of the year" according to Leo Varadkar in the second article.
Marlow wrote: » You say, this is not about you and I. But you made very personal comments and accusations about me in your post, while I was just airing some opinions. But if you name your real name, who you work for and what your intentions are, then we can go from there. And yes, it is about future proofing communication in Ireland. But the way it is done is wreckless, because various factors have been ignored. The NBP should have been scrapped and reworked at the point, when they ended with one bidder, because the purpose of the tender was not suitable anymore. It should again have been srapped, reworked and restarted, when 300k premises were taken out and awarded to OpenEIR (and Eircom PLC) changing the entire picture of the NBP. It should again have been scrapped, reworked and restarted, when due diligence was not being followed by the department and the minister leading the department. It should again have been scrapped, reworked and restarted, when it became evident, that the last remaining bidder completely changed their composition from how they entered the tender to when they submitted their bid. Other factors have become evident even beyond that point, which means, that if the contract is signed, it is a big black hole. And the fact, that a large part of the industry was denied input to the process in the first place means, that everyone in the industry (big or small players) are poking holes in it now. There is nothing comprehensive, cheap or future proofing about the current offer. 3bn is not cheap, when the result is utterly nonsense. And alone the fact, that there is a clause that the NBP Co. will be compensated for lack of take up and also the fact, that the government thinks they'll partially pay less because of VAT claw-back are ludicrous and clear signs of a lack of understanding how running a business and associated tax burdens work. The very mention of the latter shows, how little the people dealing with this actually know about the real world. /M
BarryM wrote: » I may have missed it in all the talk on this thread and elsewhere but what is the 'optimum' model for a decent, cost effective, future proofed, broadband for all, for Ireland (in 2019?).
BarryM wrote: » I think that the dail Committee suggested scrapping and starting again, but, not surprisingly, the gov won't risk the wrath of joe public by having another children's hospital fiasco.
Marlow wrote: » If you have gotten to the point of risking the wrath of joe public, then you have failed in your appointment as politician and should sign off. It goes this bad, because everyone tries to pull a fast one without research, without looking at the consequences and in essence just wants to make it to the next election day. And the NBP is an example of exactly that. And this is already another childrens hospital fiasco .. before the contracts even are signed. We started out with an indication of 3/4 bn, of which 1/3 was the irish state and the other 2/3 were the EU. Now that budget has more than trippled. Talking about fantasies and wishful thinking. If they had been honest and realistical about the figures from day one, the project would probably have been dismissed. /M
Emmanuel Lemon Louse wrote: » I think it could be argued that it is essentially an agreement between eir and DCCAE. I'm just speculating on how a challenge might be made if one is to be.
In parallel to this notification to the Department, eir made a detailed presentation in November 2016 to the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Competition (DG Competition), and outlined details of the progress of its commercial rollout of the 300,000 premises, with approximately 3,000 premises already passed and a target of 100,000 to be passed by mid-2017.
It was made clear to the Department by the European Commission over the course of several bi-lateral meetings that the revised commercial investment plan from eir and a signed Commitment Agreement could not be rejected as a legitimate commercial investment from a State Aid perspective.
As a preliminary comment, I would like to clarify that under the State aid investigations, the European Commission does not assess private investment plans that do not receive State aid (such as Eircom's private investments registered in an agreement between Ireland and Eircom you referred to),
allanpkr wrote: » Just a small point marlow...lol. your post suggests the process should have been restarted numerous times, for a number of reasons only in your mind. This only proves either you have vested interest in i presume wireless broadband or even more laughable sat broadband OR your just trolling.
clohamon wrote: » Eircom made their successful 300K challenge direct to the EC over the head of the Department. I suspect any new challenge from a (W)ISP would probably try the same route.
KOR101 wrote: » Well Eir had a product that meets the criteria, the WISPS simply don't even at the 30mb (at peak times) level. So, how long is the process likely to take?
Marlow wrote: » Current modern WISP technology can deliver 100 Mbit/s at peak with an upgrade path to 500 Mbit/s. But that is neither here nor there. Simply because some of these providers even have done small fibre rollouts, broadband over cable TV and much more. And while fixed wireless does not scale to Gbit/s that does not make it fair for them to be automatically be disqualified. Because they could take the approach to connect endusers with the speeds required (30 Mbit/s now, 100 Mbit/s by 2025) while they build other infrastructure to increase speeds even further. But that approach was never even considered. So the whole WISP bashing here is way out of line. Plenty of them are providing multiple tech anyhow. Now .. if the NBP tender process had been managed properly, there would be no backlash. But it is so full of holes and misconduct, that its ridiculous. /M
A number of submissions have been received from small operators requesting a further extension to enable the finalisation of submissions currently under preparation and the Department has decided to grant a further extension to conclude at 5.00pm on Monday 30th September, 2019.
