Europe

Hail Britannia! (on the Internet)

Doug Mohney — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 22:57:51 -0500

UK communications regulator Ofcom says the country leads 12 industrialized nations when it comes to embracing digital technology, offering the cheapest mobile, basic pay-TV and broadband rates. Further, the country spends more time on the Internet than the rest of Europe.

Broadband take rates are at 60 percent, while half the UK uses social media sites such as Facebook, Bebo and MySpace. Uploading photos to the 'net is the most popular networking activity, with 43 percent of the population participating, according to the report.

Advertisers can take heart (or fear) that nearly a fifth of advertising spending is now online, but it doesn't appear that there's cannibalization of traditional broadcast media ads to the Internet.

A poll found that of UK residents who watch online TV, 81 percent do so at least once a month, 54 percent do so weekly or more often, and 6 percent get their fix daily.

We Yanks can take comfort that we spend more minutes online per week (913) than our British cousins (839). The Brits have us beat in social networking (50 percent vs 40 in the U.S.), and Ireland has everyone beat when it comes to text messages sent per person per month - 154.

For more:
- TheTelegraph dials in UK net usage.

French gov't to retain France Telecom stake

Dan O'Shea — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 10:04:25 -0500

Rumors circulated after France Telecom's third quarter earnings report last week that the French government might be ready to sell some of its 26.79 percent stake in the nation's incumbent telco. However, government sources are now denying that is the case, according to published reports.

France's broadband market has proved to be one of the liveliest and most competitive in the world. France Telecom last week reported higher revenue for the third quarter, and its results in part were viewed as a bellwether for how Europe's major telcos might be faring amid global economic uncertainty.

For more:
- MarketWatch has a post of the government stake
- MarketWatch also has last week's earnings report

DT to partner with competitors for fiber build

Doug Mohney — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 16:15:55 -0400

Deutsche Telecom is reportedly going to work with its competitors to build out fiber networks, rather than shouldering the costs by itself.

DT fixed-infrastructure boss Timothy Höttges is apparently working out bi-lateral arrangements with several phone company competitors for infrastructure buildouts to deliver both TV and consumer high-speed broadband connections [If this reporter is deciphering the German to English translation correctly]. Previously, DT built, owned and operated the total backbone infrastructure without partners, meaning it paid all the costs and made all the profits.

Working with other phone companies currently delivering DSL and other services is a pragmatic move to stem the tide of cable TV companies moving in and a necessary preemption to government regulators attempting to force open fiber optic networks to all competitors.

For more:
- WirtschaftsWoche on DT cooperate moves for fiber builds. Article in original German.

Carrier IPTV connection rates up around the world

Doug Mohney — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 21:43:31 -0400

Worldwide subscriptions to IPTV rose to 17 million in the quarter ending June 30, a 11 percent increase from the previous quarter and a 95 percent increase from a year ago, says Point Topic .

Analysts say China and other parts of Asia will lead IPTV growth over the next five years; Western Europe currently has the most IPTV users, and AT&T is ramping up its U-verse service in the U.S.

While initial trials in Switzerland by Microsoft reportedly ran into technical problems, Switzerland IPTV subs rose 20 percent in the second quarter of this year to 80,000, capturing about 2.3 percent of households.

IPTV is also on a role in emerging markets in Eastern Europe, Latin America, and more exotic destinations like Sri Lanka and Ghana.

Gartner forecasts worldwide IPTV subscriptions will reach 54.8 million by 2010, up from an estimate of 19.6 million made at the end of 2007. If the prediction holds, 2.8 percent of households worldwide will have IPTV service by 2010, up from 1.1 percent this year.

In the U.S. Gartner says AT&T's U-verse and Verizon's FiOS services could reach 10 percent of households by 2010. Currently, AT&T has 549,000 U-verse subs and Verizon has 1.4 million FiOS subs, but only a "small percentage" of the subscribers get FiOS TV service.

The big news is in China, where an analyst at iSuppli estimates about 21 million IPTV subscribers by 2012, up from 1.9 million at the end of this year. South Korean phone companies are just starting to roll out live TV as a part of their IPTV services; regulators had limited phone companies to video-on-demand offerings. The country currently has 1.5 million IPTV users.

For more:
- Investor's Business Daily reports carriers worldwide hooking up IPTV to more subscribers. Article.

IP transit prices declining globally

Dan O'Shea — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 08:34:56 -0400

Wholesale Internet access prices are declining rapidly in much of the world, but particularly in the U.S. and Europe, where median monthly prices for 1,000 Mbps Gigabit Ethernet ports in the second quarter of 2008 varied between $10 and $14 per Mbps, according to TeleGeography. Prices are still double or triple those rates in Asian countries and even more expensive in Latin America, despite at least modest declines in both of those regions. Competition, declining equipment and lower transport costs are some of the reasons for the price drop-offs.

For more:
- check this post from TeleGeography

Orange bundles free broadband in UK

Doug Mohney — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 10:08:04 -0400

Battling back against poor customer service reports, Orange has released new deals for customers that take advantage of upgrades to its network.

New Orange Mobile customers will be offered a "free" 8 Mbps broadband connection, free wireless router and a 10GB monthly usage allowance on an 18 month contract. Any user who just wants broadband can get an 8 Mbps connection with a 10GB data cap on an 18 month contract for around 10 pounds a month with no connection fee. Other deals are available with no download limits (but with a fair usage policy clause).

In the past, Orange has been beaten up for inefficient spam filtering and poor customer satisfaction. Customer service upgrades include quicker call answering and "empowered" employees to deal with problems more effectively.

For more:
- Web User reports on new Orange UK broadband deals. Post.

EU threatens countries for weak telecom regulators

Doug Mohney — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 16:05:28 -0400

The executive branch of the European Union (EU) is opening up legal proceedings against Sweden, Lithuania and Latvia for having weak or non-independent telecomm regulators. Other nations are also getting spanked for EU telecom sins.

Sweden gets singled out for its national regulatory agency not having the power to settle interconnection disputes between operators, while national regulators in Lithuania and Lativa have failed to maintain independence from their respective telecom ministries.

All three countries have received a formal letter of notice, the first of three legal steps leading to the European Court of Justice. Spain is on step two - a "reasoned opinion" - concerning its failure to meet EU universal service requirements. Poland and Cyprus are on step three and have been referred to the Court of Justice. Poland has been accused of failing to regulate the retail market for broadband Internet access, while Cyprus has a court date over its rights of way rules.

For more:
- PC World reports EU telecom court movement. Article.

Africa soon to have a glut of bandwidth

Jim O'Neill — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 13:52:51 -0400

New submarine cables, scheduled for completion over the course of the next several years, could take Africa from a severe shortage of international bandwidth to a more-than-comfortable excess. In fact, the abundance of bandwidth could drive prices for data transmission into the bargain basement range, potentially prompting some companies to write off their investments.

Seacom's 1.3 Tbs, $650 million network along the east African coast is likely to be the first to come online. The cable will connect South Africa and East African countries with France and India. Privately backed, it should be operational in 2009. Some two-thirds of the 15,000 km cable already has been manufactured by companies in the U.S. and Japan, with shipboard delivery scheduled for September. Final splicing is set for April 2009 with two months of testing anticipated.

For more:
- See the FM Tech story

Related articles:
For telcos, submarine cable deja vu all over again? Submarine cable report
Telcos pursue $700 million Europe-India cable Telco cable report
$300 million Unity cable to link U.S. to Japan Unity cable report

Deutsche Telekom hit by data trade scandal

Jim O'Neill — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 13:34:31 -0400

Deutsche Telekom has had a tough summer. First, it was caught in a scandal involving spying on its own executives and board members. Now the German telecom is embroiled in a scandal involving the sale of its customer data to third parties.

The worst part - aside from the obvious privacy issues - is that the telco appears to have been unaware this was happening at one or more of its call centers. German public radio this week identified DT's Bremen call center as the center of the sales. DT said the call center had access to only half its 30 million-customer database.

For more:
- See the Deutsche Welle story

Related articles:
DT spying probe kicks off with a bang. DT report
Deutsche Telekom probing spy allegation Deutsche Telekom report

Also Noted: Germany has Europe's largest telecom market

Jim O'Neill — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 08:14:08 -0400

A large and affluent population that's receptive to emerging technologies has helped Germany become Europe's largest telecom market with Internet usage above European averages, according to Research and Markets. DT continues to control the fixed network and broadband markets in the country.

Source: Research and Markets

France Telecom re-assures despite profit slide

Dan O'Shea — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 11:06:18 -0400

France Telecom reported a 19 percent decline in profit for the first half of 2008 to about $4.17 billion, along with a slight revenue increase of 1.5 percent. However, while industry observers recently have been concerned about the ongoing financial performance of Europe's largest service provider, France Telecom actually re-affirmed its prior 2008 goals and said it still plans to pay a dividend in September. The telco's attempt to acquire TeliaSonera fell apart recently and France Telecom faces some serious broadband competition in its native market, but the company seems to be holding its own for now.

For more:
- read this report at The Wall Street Journal

Related articles:
France Telecom ended its bid for TeliaSonera in June. France Telecom report
France Telecom is facing heavy competition in France. France Telecom report

Ericsson profit drops 70%, but N.A. sales up

Dan O'Shea — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 23:43:10 -0400

Ericsson posted second quarter earnings that included a 70 percent decline in net income to $319 million from the second quarter last year. Corporate restructuring and the weakness of the U.S. dollar combined with a lack of return from the SonyEricsson handset joint venture continue to weigh on the company. Still, sales in North America were up 47 percent to $720 million, growth that came somewhat from IPTV and broadband-related contracts in the region.

Ericsson, which used to be most relevant as a wireless vendor where the North American market was concerned, has acquired several companies to give it a stronger front in wireline IP and broadband. The company also recently targeted the carrier Ethernet arena via its Redback Networks unit.

For more:
- see this earnings take at Light Reading Europe
- and a different one at Telephony

Related articles:
Ericsson recently moved into the carrier Ethernet space. Ericsson report
Ericsson named Hans Vestberg CFO late last year. Ericsson report

Tech exec Beal leaves BT

Dan O'Shea — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 09:42:52 -0400

Matt Beal, who was a member of the office of the CTO at BT and had become a key player in the carrier's 21st Century Network project, has left the company, according to a post at Light Reading Europe. Beal also reportedly was a backer of provider backbone transport technology, which BT supported early on, but more recently pushed onto the back burner. Beal apparently left BT a number of weeks ago.

This report comes after the departures of other key BT executives, include Ben Verwaayen, Paul Reynolds, and Andy Green, stretching back to last fall.

For more:
- see this post on Beal at Light Reading Europe's EuroBlog

Related articles:
BT CEO Ben Verwaayen announced his departure in April. BT report
BT top strategist Andy Green left the telco last fall. BT report

NSN announces multi-talented WDM platform

Dan O'Shea — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 23:41:24 -0400

It has been assumed for years that having fewer boxes in their networks is a high priority for carriers. Yet, that probably has not stopped them from deploying new, additional gear with additional capabilities if and when they felt they could not wait for a more integrated version. Nokia Siemens Networks just announced a wavelength division multiplexing platform capable of metro, regional, long-haul and ultra-long-haul transmission, dense WDM and coarse WDM and a multitude of other features. Will carriers go for such an integrated platform?

The most notable feature is ULH transmission, a capability for which carrier demand has been increasing, but one that usually is not packaged in the same platform as the other distance capabilities.

For more:
- check out this coverage at Light Reading Europe

Related articles:
WDM sales recently leapt past SONET WDM report
WDM vendor Xtera acquired Meriton earlier this year WDM report

NSN cooling on PBT after BT wavers

Dan O'Shea — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 08:53:58 -0400

While Nortel Networks is defending provider backbone transport technology in the face of primary customer BT pushing PBT onto the back burner, Nokia Siemens Networks, BT's other PBT supplier of record, seems to be walking away from it. At least, that is the indication from comments NSN executives uttered when meeting with analysts this week. NSN CEO Simon Beresford Wylie, in giving analysts an update on the first 14 months following the Nokia-Siemens merger, said the company must be cold and calculating about the technologies in which it chooses to invest its R&D dollars, sticking with innovations that have really profit potential. Meanwhile, NSN CTO Stefan Scholz said the vendor is now working with multi-protocol label switching, the technology for which PBT was intended as an alternative. Do the math on that one, and it appears Nortel could be PBT's primary proponent going forward--not that Nortel is uncomfortable with that position.

For more:
- read this story at Light Reading Europe

Related articles:
MPLS records win over PBT at BT MPLS report
PBT was one of the most talked-about network technologies last year PBT report
What's next for PBT? Here's one man's opinion PBT report

MPLS records win over PBT with BT Group decision

Jim O'Neill — Thu, 29 May 2008 22:37:35 -0400

This is one “maybe” supporters of Provider Backbone Transport (PBT) have been dreading hearing. Light Reading Europe is reporting BT Group has decided PBT isn’t robust enough for its customer needs and is looking hard at Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS) for its Ethernet services strategy. And while the decision apparently isn’t an absolute—PBT will continue to get a tickle now and again—it’s pretty obvious BT is moving on.

PBT previously was the lynchpin of BT's next-generation network (NGN) Ethernet strategy. However, BT's customers want multipoint connectivity and that's what MPLS does better. While PBT has an edge in some point-to-point scenarios and will still be used for some services such as data center connectivity, customers increasingly want MPLS for content distribution and corporate VPNs.

For more:
- See the story at Light Reading Europe

Related articles:
Interoute CTO says commercial PBT agenda confuses PBT agenda report
BT defends PBT costs BT report