Startling BT FTTH Trial

BT is installing what amounts to a test fiber-to-the-home network at Ebbsfleet, Kent, U.K. What's interesting about the 10,000-home network is the early announcement of prices.

Because U.K. broadband access operates under the wholesale Openreach model, the first thing BT is doing is announcing wholesale prices to be charged to competing service providers and BT itself to use each of the lines. Retail pricing will be set by each of the wholesale partners.

Rates range form £100 a year ($195) for a basic line to £530 ($1,038) a year for the fastest connection, at 100 Mbps.

BT still is wranging with U.K. regulators about the ultimate shape of regulations surrounding widespread fiber-to-customer networks. BT wants more freedom to use its own assets, of course, including freedom from mandatory wholesale regimes of the current sort, in the best case scenario.

From a U.S. perspective, it is striking that the first pricing information is about wholesale rates rather than retail pricing, a measure of how different the regulatory frameworks now are.

Major Reform of EU Telecom?

In a major revamp of its rules on wholesale access to optical loops, the European Commission executive branch has decided that, where competition is weak, incumbents must create separate “wholesale access” companies that sell services to all service providers.

Known as “structural separation,” the model resembles that current in the U.K. market, where BT and all other wireline providers buy access services from a wholesale OpenReach company.

The plan still must be ratified by member nations, and opposition is expected. National regulators are happy to be given more powers, but do not want the EU executive to be allowed to overrule their decisions and insist that they do not need an EU watchdog.

The European Commission says the new rules could be applied by the end of 2009, but observers expect EU states such as Germany, France and Spain to water them down.

If ratified, however, the decision essentially means competitors will have wholesale access to incumbent fiber-to-home facilities. The decision stands in stark contrast to rules in the U.S. market, where cable and telco providers are not required to lease such facilities to competitors.