Esat and 3

Mr_Man

According to an article in the Irish Times it looks as if Esat are favourites to win the contract to build the initial phase of the 3 Network. This doesn't look good for the rollout of broadband wireless....

M.

spongebob

Originally posted by Mr_Man
According to an article in the Irish Times it looks as if Esat are favourites to win the contract to build the initial phase of the 3 Network. This doesn't look good for the rollout of broadband wireless....

M.

This is Baaaaaaaaaaad news, as the Farmers would say.

Expansion of Eircoms RADSL national rollout beyond the promised initial 150 Exchanges was reliant on their Getting this contract (or a big slab of it) . The other 950 exchanges are fecked now. Eircom were sure they had this deal in the bag months ago and thet the main problem was the ESB. Three must have been terminally unimpressed with their labour charges in the RIO

Other than the exchanges they have already RADSL enabled (FlavourFlav published a list of c.70 of these recently) there will be an additional 80 RADSL exchanges by September 2004 and that is that.....unless Eircom get a cut of the contract after the 'initial stages' as the Irish Times put it.

Ironically it may be good new for BB wireless from Eircom. Eircom wanted to be a MVNO (look it up yourself) . If they are excluded from this activity by the ESAT deal then either

a) They spoil the 3G party BY offering wireless BB
or
b) They buy Meteor for the 2G spectrum......funky possibilities if we had a strong regulator........more monopolistic crap because we don't I fear.

FINALLY we can easily see for ourselves how Eircom lost the deal with Three, it was their own greed and shortsightedness as you can see here in their Facilities Access Pricelist. Access is an essential part of Colocation as proposed by Three.

Eircom are only supposed to have one Facilities Access pricelist. Asa you would expect it is eyewateringly expensive and was published as Eircom tried to munge the competition on LLU ....to stop LLU of course......and then it backfired on them.

ESAT simply quoted these prices back to Three in their negotiations less 25%-35% (which is still damn good money for opening doors) and thats in case anyone from Three is reading this . Eircom could not undercut the Published Access Prices because their position all along in the LLU negotiations was that they could NOT do it cheaper....

Greed is bad sometimes

M

bk

Quick question Muck, might this get Esat to unbundle more exchanges?

If it does, then it might actually help promote competition. However as you say it won't help people in smaller more rural exchanges.

It also might be good that the ESB haven't won the license, as now they will really have to push wireless BB last mile on their network, in order to make a return on their investment.

Perhaps the ESB may even start selling BB direct to customers over either wireless or maybe even ip over powerline.

spongebob

Originally posted by bk

Quick question Muck, might this get Esat to unbundle more exchanges?


It would make sense to unbundle some but they need only finish Dublin/Cork/Limreick/Galway/Waterford to comply with the end 2005 target of 54% (ISTR) population coverage for the 3 Network.

It also might be good that the ESB haven't won the license, as now they will really have to push wireless BB last mile on their network, in order to make a return on their investment.


The ESB are still in the frame. ESAT can use them for infill as they will allow co-lo on all their masts and don't care who is there already. ESB will not provide any Network Integration, Fibre and Towers yes......lighting them and configuring the equipment is your problem, you being ESAT or 3 interchangeably here.

Perhaps the ESB may even start selling BB direct to customers over either wireless or maybe even ip over powerline.

Their lack of inhouse expertise would tend to prevent them from being other than a carriers carrier which is their stated aim.

M

bk

Originally posted by Muck

It would make sense to unbundle some but they need only finish Dublin/Cork/Limreick/Galway/Waterford to comply with the end 2005 target of 54% (ISTR) population coverage for the 3 Network.

Well even that would be something, we might see a little bit more competition then.

Another benefit of Esat of winning this is that they will be in a much more comfortable position and less likely to go down (it was looking dangerous there for awhile). Maybe this will give them a bit more security and we will see them being more competitive and aggresive.

Their lack of inhouse expertise would tend to prevent them from being other than a carriers carrier which is their stated aim.

Why do people keep saying this, NTL, IBB, IrishWISP, Leap, Digiweb, Amocom, etc. (or even the Scottisjh power company) hadn't any expertise in selling to consumer either, but that hasn't stopped them. They simply hired in the expertise, there is no reason the ESB couldn't do the same.

The ESB have great expertise at being one of the most efficient utilities in Ireland, if not in the whole of Europe. I personally would have more faith in the ESB, then any of the above, inluding Eircom and Esat.

ednwireland

beleive it or not i heard that most of the masts have an e1 line going into them as usual the delivery method is available (wireless / backhaul network) just the will to implement is lacking

thegills

ednwireland - which masts have e1's going to them.

Most of eircell / vodafone masts are located in eircom exchanges so potentially have access to fibre.

My guess is that Esat BT will lease fibre from the various NDP funded Metro projects to access city base stations and then use their own fibre for backhauling the Metro aggregate traffic back to an MSC probably in Clonshaugh or Dundrum.

Meteor and the Gardai could provide enough sites for 3 to reach their 450 sites target