More slippage in NBS timetable

Hmm....be interesting to see what happens with the court case next week.......the one NBB are taking...

Anything could happen - from nothing at all to it being withdrawn. To be honest, no point in ever trying to second guess it - the courts will decide.

I honestly think the court case is nothing more than a bit of publicity for NBB and a chance to give the minister a black eye. Only definite outcome of it in my opinion is embarrassment for the minister for leaving the situation open for this to happen.

THE EXCLUSION of broadband satellite companies from tendering under a scheme to provide State aid to companies to extend broadband services to remote areas was done without consultation and is unfair, unreasonable and invalid, the Commercial Court was told yesterday.

Anthony Collins SC, for National Broadband Ltd (NBL), a satellite broadband provider with offices at the Georgian Village, Castleknock, Dublin, was opening the company's challenge to its exclusion from tendering under the National Broadband Scheme (NBS)

The action against the Minister for Communications, who proposes to award a contract under the scheme next month, is being heard in the Commercial Court.

NBL is challenging the Minister's decision communicated to it on January 14th last which, it alleges, excludes satellite broadband providers from tendering under the NBS and exhibits an "anti-satellite bias". The NBS is intended to provide improved access to broadband internet services in areas within the State currently without such services.

To implement the NBS, the Minister established a methodology to identify current and prospective broadband coverage within the State which involved preparing a map of the State divided into areas where broadband is (1) currently available; (2) will be available in the foreseeable future; and (3) will not be available in the foreseeable future.

In preparing the map, the Minister invited submissions for broadband service providers regarding their coverage in the State.

However, while having regard to submissions from providers using digital subscriber line or wireless/mobile technology, the Minister refused to take account of submissions from satellite service providers, NBL complains.

The case continues today.

Is this just a strategy announcement or are they going to announce who gets the NBS ? Really hope it's not 3.

http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/frontpage/2008/0624/1214257072248.html

Strategy aims for total broadband coverage in State

HARRY MCGEE, Political Staff

IRELAND WILL have "ubiquitous" broadband coverage by the end of next year and will enjoy broadband speeds that will be among the highest in Europe by 2012, according to a Government strategy to be announced next week.

The "Next Generation" broadband strategy will be published on July 3rd by Minister for Communications Eamon Ryan. An internal Department of Communications document seen by The Irish Times says the aim of the strategy will be to have "ubiquitous access to broadband by 2009".

It continues: "By 2012 speeds equivalent to or higher than that in competitor EU regions will be available over a variety of platforms."

The paper concedes these targets are challenging, as 40 per cent of the population live in rural areas and fewer than 10 per cent live in apartments, unlike many European countries where populations tend to live in densely-populated urban environments.

Another innovation, according to the paper, will be the separation of services from the network used to deliver these services. Mr Ryan strongly suggested at a telecoms industry event last month that his preference was for such open-ended networks through which all operators could provide services.

Next week's launch comes four months after Mr Ryan convened a group of international experts to advise him on the strategy.

Among the issues considered was whether the Government should fund the development of next-generation broadband or whether it should allow the roll-out to be led by the private sector, with State funding being provided only for areas that might be ignored.

The experts also advised the department on the relative merits of fixed and wireless services for the delivery of the fastest-possible and cheapest-possible broadband.

While broadband take-up continues to grow quickly in Ireland, the last benchmarking update by Forfás at the end of 2007 showed that broadband penetration in Ireland still lagged behind the OECD average, and that there remained a limited range and speed of broadband services. It showed that the fastest speed widely available of six megabytes per second costs four to five times more than much higher-speed services in countries such as France, Germany and Hungary.

The procurement process to roll out broadband under the National Broadband Scheme to the remaining 10 per cent of the State is currently on hold due to a High Court challenge to the process.

Fine Gael's communications spokesman Simon Coveney has been a consistent critic of Mr Ryan's broadband policies.

Mr Coveney has said that Mr Ryan has not moved quickly enough to make good the deficit, pointing to statistics that shows Ireland lying 20th out of 30 OECD countries for penetration and 33rd out of 35 countries for speed.

Ah yes, Im sure theres lots we can teach the Japanese

A short and sweet little piece from Walter Mitty
http://www.independent.ie/breaking-news/national-news/govt-aims-for-100-broadband-coverage-by-end-2009-1420097.html

If Satellite was a comparable solution to good fixed wireless or dsl everyone would have it already because it is pretty much available nationwide.

So going by your last post, we can agree that satellite is a poor solution, and a solution available pretty much anywhere right now, right?

Then why the need to include it in the NBS? The vast majority (if not 100%) of the last NBS "10%" can get satellite, but because of it's latency, contention, low speed, and expense, it's not suitable as a reliable, modern broadband source. That will be the opinion of everyone in the industry, users who have access to both, and the founders of the NBS.

So far, the only opinion contrary to that is that of satellite resellers (and they're just that .. resellers of a service provided by someone else altogether). I can't recall anyone else expressing the opinion that satellite is a viable broadband solution. Not to be confused when there's nothing else available, it's a God-send.

Which begs the question: do you run, or work for, a satellite internet provider or an agent thereof?

Cheap < €60 a month Sat is often poorer than 3G/HSDPA, very very high contention (some services you share with whole of Europe!). Buisness grade Satellite always better than 3G/HSDPA, basically DSL performance but TEN times plus (> 850ms) latency is about €200 per month.

Thus Satellite is not an alternative IMO to an NBS.

Heard November mentioned by the Department too last week. And if it's late November then it could very well be January because December is a bad month but then so is January...