Sky to launch an assault on the Irish broadband market

maquiladora

The Irish Independent says that broadcasting giant BSkyB is to launch an assault on the Irish broadband market in a move that is expected to shake up the fast internet access sector further. Delia Bushell, managing director of Sky Ireland, told the newspaper the company will have finalised its strategy by the end of the year, although it is unclear yet as to whether the services will only be available to Sky subscribers.

http://www.enn.ie/news.html?code=9666994

Linoge

Satelite broadband. It wins the Darwin award for technology IMO:rolleyes:

Valentia

This must be one of the best examples of non news ever. :rolleyes:

paulm17781

Sky bought a LLU company in the UK, I can't remember who. Odds are they will do the same here. Probably more news worthy than you think.

cgarvey

paulm17781 wrote:

Sky bought a LLU company in the UK, I can't remember who. Odds are they will do the same here. Probably more news worthy than you think.

Rubbish (the news worthiness bit).

Sky bought Easynet.. but there is a reasonably successful LLU environment in the UK .. there's not here, and it is unlikely that there will be by the end of the year, when Sky plan to release their news.

A year is a long time in telecoms. This is not news.

.cg

Anarchist

It might not be groundbreaking and yes alot happens in a year but it was still an interesting post, plz ignore the doom merchants.

hefty_langer

I'm not sure which company are worse, Sky or €ircon... They both have pretty bad reps

kaizersoze

Why do I fail to get excited about these announcements when the include sentences like "the company will have finalised its strategy by the end of the year":).

bk

Well if they were to purchase Smart or Magnet, like they did with Easynet in the UK. It could inject a significant amount of cash into the company and give it a great of publicity, with a well known brand name and ability to directly advertise to existing Sky customers.

It would also benefit from sharing network infrastructure, equipment and expertise with the much larger Easynet.

So it certainly wouldn't be a bad thing and it would certainly put more presure on Eircom.

KTRIC

And in other breaking news today, "I got new shoe's !!"

Sparky

K-TRIC wrote:

And in other breaking news today, "I got new shoe's !!"

Jesus, me too, small world eh, i also managed to flush a toilet also.

watty

It almost certinally will NOT directly involve satellite but Terrestrial Wireless and aDSL. Perhaps just another UTV.

I agree it is a non-news item as we already were told this when they bought easynet.

KTRIC

Sparky-s wrote:

i also managed to flush a toilet also.

Good on ya mate, well done.

I think we've just brought the interest level of this whole thread up a whole notch

1huge1

hefty_langer wrote:

I'm not sure which company are worse, Sky or €ircon... They both have pretty bad reps

i never heard of anyone slagging of sky they have one of the best digital tv services in the world (especially if you have sky +) if not the best
only drawback is there a bit pricy

Duiske

1huge1 wrote:

i never heard of anyone slagging of sky they have one of the best digital tv services in the world (especially if you have sky +) if not the best
only drawback is there a bit pricy

Very true. All them edumakational channels like playbo.....err...i mean discovery and stuff like that...excellent :rolleyes:

cgarvey

bk wrote:

Well if they were to purchase Smart or Magnet, like they did with Easynet in the UK.

It's not money that's holding back Smart's rollout .. it's the lack of LLU. Real LLU I mean. If Sky bought Smart/Magnet they'd run in to the same problems. Now Sky would probably have better brand recognition than Smart (and definitely more than Magnet), so that would account for some additional revenue, but LLU is still the problem, not money (within reason, obviously).

.cg

Blaster99

How does eircom's substandard LLU procedures prevent Smart from enabling an exchange? They're way behind in their roll-out programme.

cgarvey

Blaster99 wrote:

How does eircom's substandard LLU procedures prevent Smart from enabling an exchange? They're way behind in their roll-out programme.

Talk to Smart!

Eircom are too busy, there's not enough space, there's not enough aircon, the building is unsuitable, changing the entry path into the building (now that's one way to delay) .. the usual stuff.

.cg

dub45

cgarvey wrote:

Talk to Smart!

Eircom are too busy, there's not enough space, there's not enough aircon, the building is unsuitable, changing the entry path into the building (now that's one way to delay) .. the usual stuff.

.cg

Not releasing lines over the Christmas period was one example small I know but it probably put installations back by at least a month and then the calls to customer service etc etc - all hassle.......bet Smart lost some customers over that little stunt.

Freddie59

watty wrote:

It almost certinally will NOT directly involve satellite but Terrestrial Wireless and aDSL. Perhaps just another UTV.

You could be right, but as an earlier poster said, they could buy Magnet or Smart. I'd say Smart will be the ones myself.;)

PoolDude

Sky are to announce their Broadband plans today.

KTRIC

PoolDude wrote:

Sky are to announce their Broadband plans today.

For the UK only.

Laguna

Is it satellite broadband or what that they have planned, it'd be the only way they could offer me their service (I already have Sky TV but live in the middle of nowhere, so no BB via phoneline or wireless)...

dahamsta

It's a DSL service.

m_stan

and here's the info on their site. Must be ADSL2+ if they are doing up to 16MB.

Dord

more info will be available on this tomorrow. it is a DSL service though. basically they bought easynet. and are using easynets systems that are already in place in BT phone exchanges, theyre also putting in more in other exchanges. theyre just using the BT exchanges though, from there on its their own lines. but i'm sorry to say it won't be available here yet.

Oh yeah, its only for sky subscribers. and only in the UK

kevmac

But if they did something on the lines of the this we would laughing:

Sky offers 'free' broadband service - UPDATED
By Macworld staff


First there was Sky TV, then Sky Digital, and later the mighty Sky+. Today, Sky is to join the growing ranks of 'free' broadband suppliers with the launch of its Sky Broadband service this afternoon.


Three broadband products are being made available when the service launches in August: Sky Broadband Base, Mid and Max. All three products are available to any Sky digital customer covered by Sky’s expanding broadband network. All three ship with wireless routers.


Sky Broadband Base is free to Sky digital customers covered by the Sky Broadband network. It offers download speeds of up to 2Mb and a 2GB monthly usage allowance.


Sky Broadband Mid costs costs £5 per month, and offers download speeds of to up 8Mb and 40GB of usage. Sky Broadband Max costs a competitive £10 a month and offers download speeds of up to 16Mb, unlimited downloads and free installation.


Carphone Warehouse started the free-broadband bandwagon rolling earlier in the year with is all-in-one £20.99 TalkTalk service. This was followed by others, including mobile-phone operator Orange's service for 18-month pay-monthly mobile plans of £30 and above. ISP PlusNet also has a range of broadband and free-calls services available from £20.99, with a 1-month tie-in period. This is available to more UK customers than the TalkTalk or Orange deals.


Sky Broadband also offers PC users a year’s free subscription to the McAfee Internet Security Suite, worth £49.98. Mac users receive 12 months of free McAfee Virex protection.


Advance registration for Sky Broadband begins today. Sky will invest around £400m at the operating profit level over the next three years to develop its broadband business.

http://87.86.186.37/flash.htm

Foxwood

All of these "free" services in the UK depend on the suppliers using LLU to get access to your line. Comreg still hasn't forced eircom to make a working LLU product available in Ireland (you can't yet keep your phone number i your line is unbundled, and unbundling your line will cause all sorts of service interruptions for other services). And the company that unbundles your line will still have to pay eircom about €15 (ex VAT) per month in "line rental".

So don't expect to see "free" broadband on quite this scale in Ireland in the near future. You can get it for €10 more than your line rental from BT or Smart or Imagine, but eircom is still laughing all the way to the bank.

dahamsta

Sky only uses LLU (or ULL, as they call it) in some areas (50%? 58%?) in the UK. And it's only partial LLU. Much like we have in Ireland in fact, although of course the scale is a lot smaller in Ireland.

There's nothing stopping ComReg setting a realistic price on LLU in Ireland, with realistic terms and conditions, and taking Eircom to court asap to force it down their throat. They do like the courts, after all, it gives them a chance to look knowledgeable and important.

The EU would back them too; it would have to, given the guff they spout about broadband. Unfortunately they still lack a vital element: Balls.

I said LLU should be the priority five years ago. So did everyone else with a brain in their head. Yet here we are...

adam

Foxwood

Ken Shabby wrote:

Sky only uses LLU (or ULL, as they call it) in some areas (50%? 58%?) in the UK. And it's only partial LLU. Much like we have in Ireland in fact, although of course the scale is a lot smaller in Ireland.

Sky will only LLU exchanges where they've enough customers to make it worthwhile, but hell, even eircom barely have DSL gear in 58% of exchanges, it'll be a long time before we see any non-eircom-bitstream service available on that scale in Ireland.

There's nothing stopping ComReg setting a realistic price on LLU in Ireland, with realistic terms and conditions, and taking Eircom to court asap to force it down their throat. They do like the courts, after all, it gives them a chance to look knowledgeable and important.

Has comreg ever taken eircom to court and won?

dahamsta

A better question would probably be: Has ComReg ever taken Eircom to court? They certainly haven't fined them a penny.

adam