[UK] BT to introduce 1mbit home dsl

Moriarty

BT to trial 1Mb ADSL in October
By Tim Richardson


BT Wholesale is to begin a six-week trial of a new 1 Mb ADSL service aimed at home users, the monster telco confirmed today.

IPStream Home1000 - as it's called - could give ISPs the chance to take on speedier services offered by cablecos NTL and Telewest. Then again...

The trial starts on October 6 following internal tests during September. The monthly wholesale rental for the trial is £23 (ex VAT) with £50 (ex VAT) for activation.

According to details released by BT Wholesale today, BT IPStream Home 1000 will be a 'wires only' self install product.

All ISPs currently reselling BT's ADSL service will be able to take part in the trial and will be able to sign up as many punters as they like during the pilot stage. BT will start accepting applications from ISPs from September 1.

Explaining that punters can opt for different packages, the telco said it will be possible "to migrate or regrade users from BT IPStream Home 500 to BT IPStream Home 1000, and vice versa, during the trial and from launch", although there is likely to be a fee for this flexibility.

BT Wholesale announced back in March that it planned to trial a 1Mbps ADSL service in the autumn. ®

Moriarty

A nice low price by BT, i think most will agree.

BTs current wholesale adsl pricing (ex vat):
512kbit/256kbit - £13/month (€18.77)
1mbit/256kbit - £23/month (€33.20)

Eircoms current wholesale adsl pricing (ex vat):
512kbit/128kbit - €27/month
1mbit/128kbit - €79/month

Go team eircom!

spongebob

only 70% more than their wholesale price for the 512k product. Telewest and NTL must be hurting them . Thats £27.03 Incl VAT @ 17.5%

Telewest charge a RETAIL price of £40 for 1Mb and £55 for 2Mb including VAT , see
Here , less if you take their phone service at the same time.

NTL charge £35 a month for 1Mb RETAIL incl Vat.

BT Wholesale haven't left any margin for ISP's to tackle those kind of prices but they will probably have to drop the price for their 512k product again this year.

M

SkepticOne

Originally posted by Moriarty
A nice low price by BT, i think most will agree.

BTs current wholesale adsl pricing (ex vat):
512kbit/256kbit - £13/month (€18.77)
1mbit/256kbit - £23/month (€33.20)

Eircoms current wholesale adsl pricing (ex vat):
512kbit/128kbit - €27/month
1mbit/128kbit - €79/month

Go team eircom!

Eircom are doing the correct thing from a business point of view by keeping their prices high, imo.

cmdrpaddy

they arent doing the right thing by keeping their prices high, keep your prices high and people wil refuse to use the service and eventually it becomes uneconomical to keep it going, lower the price and more people subscribe hence you make more money.

sceptre

Originally posted by cmdrpaddy
they arent doing the right thing by keeping their prices high, keep your prices high and people wil refuse to use the service and eventually it becomes uneconomical to keep it going, lower the price and more people subscribe hence you make more money.

That's assuming that they want people to use DSL, rather than to continue pumping money into pay per minute dialup services. From their own business perspective they make more money if people don't, therefore from their own business perspective they're doing the right thing by keeping DSL prices high.

Moriarty

Originally posted by sceptre
That's assuming that they want people to use DSL, rather than to continue pumping money into pay per minute dialup services. From their own business perspective they make more money if people don't, therefore from their own business perspective they're doing the right thing by keeping DSL prices high.

.. Which is why a regulator is needed. Unfortunatly comreg either (1) couldnt give a damn any which way or (2) feels it doesnt have the power behind it to force further change on eircom.

css

sceptre is right, the longer they can drag it out via courts, etc. the more they stand to gain.. unfortunate but true..

The Insider

Of course eircom want people to get DSL, they are after investing millions in bulding up a network, do you think after all that they are going to actively discourage people signing up to there service! The reason the price is so high at the moment is Eircom is trying to get back some of there initial investment into there network, the price will drop in time. If you look back at when DSL was introduced into the UK you will see exatly the same thing happened there as is happening here now.

Urban Weigl

Nice to see that Eircom have joined the forum now.

spongebob

Originally posted by The Insider
The reason the price is so high at the moment is Eircom is trying to get back some of there initial investment into there network, the price will drop in time.

Yahh. The important bit is that Eircom knew by the time they launched ADSL (in April 2002) that the price had to drop IN ORDER that they make their money back. DSL launches had occured in most EU countries in 1998-9 , there was a wealth of data on adoption curves etc by April 2002.

The first moves towards realistic pricing were in January 2003 when the RADSL rollout was announced. By then Eircom had 2,000-2,500 ADSL connections installed in 8 months. The revenue stream from these would have been in the order of €2m A MONTH when the lower prices were announced. Over that initial period some 40-50 new connections came on stream every week. Eircom also knew that the takeup was risible and price elastic ........ same lessons learnt in Europe in 2000 or so.

Eircom had (allegedly) invested €150m (was it not IR£120m) Million in DSL , and was pulling in €24m a year so its rate of return before depreciation was about 20% while the depreciation was about 20% . Halving the entry level price in January has tripled or quadrupled the connection rates per month at half the revenue per connection per month giving twice the reveue stream. The connection rates are now around 300-400 a week.

Halving the price again again could quadruple the connection rate again from that level to some 1,200 - 1,500 a week

Phil Nolan has set a target to his staff of 100,000 connections by 31 December 2004. That target date now is some 70 weeks away. and his staff have left Phil at least 90,000 connections shy........meaning that Eircom will have to do something drastic (intelligent even ) to reach the high level of connections required.

I work it out at 1,300 a week, every week from now. Eircoms connect rate has plateaued at a level that will make it impossible to reach Phils target. Phils target for end 2004 was passed by the UK in the winter of 2002 given their greater cable penetration so all Phil intends to do is to keep the UK in sight lest it tear over the horizon .

Halve dem prices now, if there is no €29.99 product in the christmas stockings then the target cannot be met. If the pricing is wrong by the end of October 2003 then the target Cannot be met anyway.

M (©®©`August 2003)

dahamsta

Well, if the rumours about ungraded exchanges not being made available yet (posted in bb4b thread) are true, they seem to be going about accelerating the takeup a damned odd way? Perhaps you can enlighten us on this one Insider?

adam

The Insider

Originally posted by Urban Weigl
Nice to see that Eircom have joined the forum now.

???? Because I make a statement that is not anti-eircom I suddenly am Eircom, whats the point in having this board if not for debate, to often when I read these posts they are too one sided, all I am doing is trying to bring a bit of balance to the equation.

Muck did I just not make the exact same point in one line as you did in about 5 paragraphs? I said the price will drop after eircom recruit back some of their original investment

Originally posted by Muck
Halve dem prices now, if there is no €29.99 product in the christmas stockings then the target cannot be met.

exactly...

SkepticOne

Originally posted by The Insider
Muck did I just not make the exact same point in one line as you did in about 5 paragraphs? I said the price will drop after eircom recruit back some of their original investment
exactly...

I think Muck was making the point that in order to get that return in the first place Eircom should lower their prices now. The fact that they are not doing so means that they are probably still milking those revenue streams that would otherwise be displaced by DSL.

thegills

Insider,
What do you make of this.

In Limerick there where a lot of companies looking for DSL; they were already paying over the top for ISDN. They where told the usual - 6 weeks etc. In the meantime eircom built a new exchange in Crossagalla and duly transfered all of those business's over to the new exchange. Now you would imagine that if eircom where building an exchange from scratch they'd surely put in DSL?? No.
So now these business's have no alternative to ISDN.

This highlights 2 things;

1. eircom don't care about DSL
2. eircom want to flog the life out of ISDN

thegills

spongebob

Eircom did the same thing in Galway when they built the Knocknacarra exchange . They then built an even smaller one around College Road ....about the size of a bicycle shed. Rumour has it that they have another titch in mind to handle the Doughiska zone on the Eastern approaches .

The new exchanges are absolutely tiny and cannot take DSLAMs.

Comreg haven't noticed this, whats new.

M

The Insider

Just because eircom are creating a new exchange does not mean they are going to put a ASAM into it. Eircom are always upgrading there network, but upgrading there network does not necessarly mean upgrading a exchange so it is DSL ready. Eircom are not going to put a ASAM in every exchange in the country not a chance.
And before you start giving out about Eircom again what about Esat, I mean Eircom are not the only telecommunications company in Ireland, what role are Esat playing in the broadband drive?
As for them wanting people to stay on ISDN trust me they need people to take up DSL its what they are going to drive there business with in the next year.

spongebob

New Exchanges are typically suburban and are installed in areas where such as Knocknacarra and College Rd. in Galway and Tyrellstown in Dublin and Crosgalla in Limerick.

The lines to the houses/flats are typically underground from there and are spanking new copper. The houses are then populated by working people, generally computer literate aged 20-40 years old , the ideal demographic for DSL takeup. The lines should be technically ideal for DSL and the population density within range of these exchanges is ideal for DSL as well with 10-14 housing units to the acre being the norm.

Yet the exchanges in these areas with underground lines and perfect demographics are so SMALL they cannot PHYSICALLY take DSLAM's .

The affected exchanges have been planned built and owned by Eircom and have generally been constructed since 1998. I say 1998 because Eircom began its DSL testing around then and derived information on phyical E-Side requirements for DSL from those tests.

ESAT are also remiss but I would grant them affordable LLU first before I bitched at them about their rollout which stopped dead at 40 exchanges last year.

There are 1100 exchanges in Ireland.

ESAT did 40. Eircom did the SAME forty and have publickly committed to 150 although I hear it will be 180-220 by the time the rollout finishes in September 2004 (or is it earlier)

220 out of 1100 is 20%. 80% of exchanges will not have DSL capability .

Thoughts Insider?

M

SkepticOne

Originally posted by The Insider
As for them wanting people to stay on ISDN trust me they need people to take up DSL its what they are going to drive there business with in the next year.

So what were they thinking charging 107 euros for bog standard euros that they knew nobody would be fool enough to chough up for? Why did they have an extremely strict qualification criteria with everyone over a mile failing the test?

What were they thinking then? What has changed now? Why are they still charging 54 euros, a price they know is unattractive according to published market research?

The Insider

Originally posted by SkepticOne
So what were they thinking charging 107 euros for bog standard euros that they knew nobody would be fool enough to chough up for?

The 107 euros package still exists, Eircom do 2 different DSL packages, ADSL and RADSL. ADSL starter pack is 107 euro per month, with this you get a guaranteed download speed of 512k and a upload of 128, your contention ratio is 24:1 and there is a 6 gig cab.
The 54 euro product is RADSL, this product was launced in April 2003, with this you get a guaranteed download speed of 256k and a upload of 128k, your contention ratio is 48:1 and you have a 4 gig cab.

As regards the fact that they had an extremely strict qualifcation criteria, well there is a difference between how far you need to be from a exchange in order to get these products, for ADSL it is 3.3km, and for RADSL it is 5.5km. The reason you have to be so cloase is because DSL is a distance senstive technology, the further it has to travel over copper the more it detoriates.

Why are they still charging 54 euros, a price they know is unattractive according to published market research?

At the moment eircom are doing exactly what evey other telecommunications company has done when they have introduced DSL. They are using the standard adoption curve. Check out the image I attached with this reply. The price will drop in the future.

Muck I don't have time to reply in length to your post at the moment, surfice to say that the 20% of the exchanges done will cover a great deal more then 20% of the population.

spongebob

'Mind the Gap'

I look forward to your reply insider.

M

SkepticOne

Originally posted by The Insider
The 107 euros package still exists, Eircom do 2 different DSL packages, ADSL and RADSL. ADSL starter pack is 107 euro per month, with this you get a guaranteed download speed of 512k and a upload of 128, your contention ratio is 24:1 and there is a 6 gig cab.

Yes, but until recently, that was the only DSL product on the market and the cap was 3 gigs not 6. Eircom were taking advantage of their monopoly over the local loop. If there was any form of competition, they would not have been able to get away with this sort of nonsense. The price was so high that even Eircom were not even making money. Not that they were interested since those who did not take up the product were most likely making just as much if not more from metered services.

The 54 euro product is RADSL, this product was launced in April 2003, with this you get a guaranteed download speed of 256k and a upload of 128k, your contention ratio is 48:1 and you have a 4 gig cab.

This is the product that Eircom should have come out with first had it been operating in a competitive environment. The technology was well established in 2001. However, since it is not a comptitive environment, they had the luxury of delaying its introduction for over a year.

At the moment eircom are doing exactly what evey other telecommunications company has done when they have introduced DSL. They are using the standard adoption curve. Check out the image I attached with this reply. The price will drop in the future.

I agree. They are taking advantage of their almost total monopoly to extract maximum revenue out of each segment.

Incidentally, that same diagram was also shown in a Forfas report which led them to recommend the introduction of flat rate. Their point was that while the crutch of metered access was there, Eircom had little incentive to do anything about the limited availability and extreme prices for DSL.

The situation could be transformed if the incumbent offered a flat rate interconnection package so that a competing operator could pass this on to its customers in the form of a flat rate package. Competition would emerge quickly as operators compete to win customers. The incumbent would be forced to offer its own comparable packages. Flat-rate access among heavy users would become the norm and the disincentive of revenue loss from the introduction of broadband would be removed –those revenues would be gone anyway.

Some of this has come to pass however further action is still needed.

Urban Weigl

Originally posted by The Insider At the moment eircom are doing exactly what evey other telecommunications company has done when they have introduced DSL.[/B]

There is a very, very big difference. When other telcoms launched ADSL services between 1996 and 1999, modems very expensive. DSLAM ports were expensive. There was little experience, and providing the service was a risk (nobody knew whether people would take it up, whether it would work as well in the real world as during testing, and so on).

Today we do not have 1996, 7, 8 or even 9. The cost per port for a DSLAM port is under 50 euros. ADSL modems are available for as little as 20 euros a pop, wholesale. The service has been tested and established for many years. Some telcos in the US say that it is no far cheaper to provide ADSL than dialup even, as there is less support, and it does not use any switching or other aspects of the normal telephone network.

The Insider

Originally posted by Urban Weigl
There is a very, very big difference. When other telcoms launched ADSL services between 1996 and 1999

Bt only launched their consumer service in Autumn 2000

(nobody knew whether people would take it up, whether it would work as well in the real world as during testing, and so on).

It was only April 2001 when these kind of scare storys were being banded about http://news.zdnet.co.uk/hardware/emergingtech/0,39020357,2085730,00.htm hence Eircom's reluctence to enter the broadband market.

The cost per port for a DSLAM port is under 50 euros. ADSL modems are available for as little as 20 euros a pop, wholesale. .

Any idea how much a ASAM costs to put into a exchange? The cost of ADSL modems is irrelvant in the cost of DSL per month

as there is less support

DSL techs cost more per head then IP techs. You also need to train up current IP techs. When a DSL call comes in, it generally costs a lot more then your average IP call. Why you ask? DSL calls are followed up on untill they are resolved, each tech takes case ownership, IP techs don't.

spongebob

Originally posted by The Insider
DSL techs cost more per head then IP techs. You also need to train up current IP techs. When a DSL call comes in, it generally costs a lot more then your average IP call. Why you ask? DSL calls are followed up on untill they are resolved, each tech takes case ownership, IP techs don't.

Hmmm , is it that hard to train the staff ? A lot of this work is outsourced ISTR .

Any answers to my 'size' question then?

M

The Insider

Originally posted by Muck
New Exchanges are typically suburban and are installed in areas where such as Knocknacarra and College Rd. in Galway and Tyrellstown in Dublin and Crosgalla in Limerick.

As I said before Eircrom are not going to have every new exchange equpped with a ASAM. I understand your point about these areas been ideal etc, but Eircom will take the same approach as BT has succesfully taken, using trigger levels to enable exchanges. IMO

Yet the exchanges in these areas with underground lines and perfect demographics are so SMALL they cannot PHYSICALLY take DSLAM's.

I have to take your word for this Muck. Have you seen the exchanges in question yourself or are you just going by word or mouth?

ESAT are also remiss but I would grant them affordable LLU first before I bitched at them about their rollout which stopped dead at 40 exchanges last year.

hmm... for me this is the biggest problem in the telecommunications sector, no competion for Eircom, not other company pushing them, LLU is a discussion for another day, but I don't see why Esat can't continue with updrading exchanges with there own ASAM's, but then again its handy for Esat using there IOL guise to piggyback on the Eircom network which Eircom built, come to think of it why are Esat not offering a residential package out of there own Network, becuase they would lose money???

220 out of 1100 is 20%. 80% of exchanges will not have DSL capability.

Yeah but 20% of the exchanges those not mean 20%of the population, those 220 exchanges will cover in excess of a million people(don't have exact figures) in the region of 30-35%, ok I now this is not ideal but it is better then the figures your posting.

The Insider

Originally posted by Muck
Hmmm , is it that hard to train the staff ? A lot of this work is outsourced ISTR .

No, I know of no ISP in Ireland that outsources their tech staff (though I stand to be corrected)
Maybe hard is the wrong word, it is more a drain on resources, think about how long it would take to train up say 150 staff and then you get the picture.

spongebob

Originally posted by The Insider

As I said before Eircom are not going to have every new exchange equpped with a ASAM.
Trigger levels are irrelevant. Each of those exchanges is already around the official Eircom trigger level which is 2000 lines (except the Limerick one I Think). If not, there are hundreds of housing units in the pipeline for the area so they will make the trigger in no time.
I have to take your word for this Muck. Have you seen the exchanges in question yourself or are you just going by word or mouth?

2 of them, absolutely tiny buildings with low roofs and inadequate Air Conditioning from what I could see. Frame rooms.
I don't see why Esat can't continue with upgrading exchanges with there own ASAM's, but then again its handy for Esat using there IOL guise to piggyback on the Eircom network which Eircom built, come to think of it why are Esat not offering a residential package out of there own Network, becuase they would lose money???

They did offer a Residential package but ENSURED that virtually nobody got it. Search for ESAT and Residential (top right) between October 2002 and May. It was a right palaver.

ESAT allegedly require LLU at or around the Prof Melody rates (still one of the most expensive in the EU) . They should still continue to roll out but they should also roll out RADSL and not ADSL....something ESAT never did. I am not supportive of their sitting on their arses with 40 exchanges......especially as they managed less than 1 residential DSL customer PER ENABLED EXCHANGE in 6 months or so.

Yeah but 20% of the exchanges those not mean 20%of the population, those 220 exchanges will cover in excess of a million people(don't have exact figures) in the region of 30-35%, ok I now this is not ideal but it is better then the figures your posting.
Again allegedly. Among the million lines are the OLDEST ones in the state and the largest sites in the state with multiple lines per premises. Additionally, many of these LARGE exchanges are stuffed. Shantalla in Galway is an example. The small exchanges I mentioned above are often built to take pressure off the large exchanges and are turning into denial of service systems. 1 million lines ain't one million customers.

Is it 220 exchanges????

Officially is is 150 by 30/09/2004 but I heard from 'sources' that it may be 180 by 31/03/2004. A dramatic acceleration of the installation process would be good news in its own right ...never mind the numbers of exchanges. If the number of exchanges is heading for 220 that implies a drop to 1500 line Trigger Levels from the 2000 lines at least that are in the top 150 exchanges.

Crudely the 20% figure is a geographic indicator. The most densely populated 12-15% of the state (DSL being a distance limited technology) will get it. The other 5-8% covered by that exchange will be too far out.

So the other 85%+ will NOT get it. The other 85%+ of the state , by geographic area , should not hang around waiting either. I live in the other bit!

M