Eircom pulling wool over IOFFL?

hmmm

First don't assume this is another anti-Eircom rant, it isn't.

The broadband price cuts announced today are small, but allow Eircom huge opportunity to promote their point of view. Eircom reps are suddenly available to media outlets to talk all about their broadband rollout. Figures like a 100k connection target by end 2004 are mentioned. Unchallenged talk of "5th lowest" is common.

It's already being pointed out in a few other threads, but I haven't seen much acknowledgement. With the Government under pressure, and in response to this pressure proposing to pretty much compete with Eircom, all these announcements put pressure on the Government to either scale back or not proceed with the plans. Eircom announcing connection figures that look unrealistic (but aren't challenged in the meeja) take the pressure off to create an alternative, and Eircom get another year to cream the market. The Eircom PR strategy has gone from being downright abusive to one that is equally abusive but much more subtle.

I'm concerned that IOFFL are playing into Eircom's hands by praising what are small price cuts, and will do damage to the message that the cost and availability of broadband is still appalling in comparison to other countries.

SkepticOne

I don't think IOFFL has responded to this yet.

dahamsta

I hope IOFFL does soon.

Xian

Originally posted by hmmm
I'm concerned that IOFFL are playing into Eircom's hands by praising what are small price cuts, and will do damage to the message that the cost and availability of broadband is still appalling in comparison to other countries.

You shouldn't be concerned as we haven't, and won't, respond. We respond to significant events in Internet access in Ireland and something that is inevitable can't be considered significant. A combination of

• an imminent direction from Ahern to do so if they didn't
• nationwide 3.5 GHz rollout in the coming months (almost, by population - don't quibble: from a hard-nosed financial perspective it's Real Competition(TM))
• a public commitment to 100k subscribers by end 2004 - unimaginable at the current price, viz. the number-crunching Muck showed when the announcement was first made

make this announcement inevitable.

That is not to say it's a retrograde step, by any means. It'll put more bums on seats, people rightly unwilling to pay over the top for a service, but taken from the perspective of the core issue, being platform competition, it will also up the ante for WISPs to compete head-to-head, a task I'm sure they're capable of but margins will have been reduced all the same - something they, as most, will have taken into account anyway.

So, as to your remaining concerns. 100k? Probably true given the trend of announcements. It's likely that they've popped their cherry on DSL by now (financially:)) and, as pointed out, given the impending competition will want to stay ahead of the pack. 5th lowest? C'mon! You want to play the statistics game? "According the incumbent player, its decision to introduce a low cost 512k broadband product at 39.99 per month will make it the cheapest out of 14 countries for this type of product. " (siliconrepublic) "According to Eircom, the price cut would make Irish prices equivalent with those in the UK and will make Ireland the fifth cheapest market in Europe for a comparable product" (enn). So, lets go off and find out comparable statistics from Europe. But wait! Last time I checked there're 15 countries in the EU, so which ones are they counting? And which telco in each country are they comparing themselves with, and what spec, and what adjustment do they make to normalize cases where specs don't match. Oh, and don't talk to me about line rental. I've had it up to Here

No, my main concern in all of this is the repeated carping at not receiving part of the funding announced by Ahern last month for regional broadband, conveniently forgetting the fact (see page 19) that they turned down millions in funding only two years ago for just that.

Eircom, as ever, are acting purely in their own self interest. That it coincides with the interest of others in this particular case is coincidental. Any such coincidence will inevitably recede as their ultimate interest lies in shoring up the monopoly they have inherited.

SkepticOne

Originally posted by Xian
Originally posted by hmmm
No, my main concern in all of this is the repeated carping at not receiving part of the funding announced by Ahern last month for regional broadband, conveniently forgetting the fact (see page 19) that they turned down millions in funding only two years ago for just that.

The government should see Eircoms proposal as vindication of their decision not to award Eircom funding. Afterall, the only thing Eircom fear is competition and, by awarding funding to others (not Eircom) this competition is encouraged. The mistake in the past has been throwing money at Eircom. It did not achieve anything except further entrench the embarrasing situation.

spongebob

This was my scenario in August.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?postid=1075876#post1075876

dahamsta

Seems odd to me that IrelandOffline wouldn't take advantage of a little easy publicity to state a few facts and figures to the press and make sure that people understand - as Xian so rightly points out - that Eircom isn't doing this to compete, but to survive. I don't doubt that a clever gentleman like Minister Ahern will see right through this, but the same cannot be said for many of his colleagues in Government. And perhaps more importantly, one can already see Minister McCreevy rubbing his little paws together with excitement at the prospect of a budget cut in Minister Ahern's department come the day after the local elections...

But of course I'm out of touch, and my understanding of the politics may be sub par.

adam