OFCOM have recently announced a lowering in the price which BT can charge other operators for providing broadband Internet access. Sounds good for consumers but you might look at this interesting article from the BBC's Rory Cellan=Jones.
The basic point made is that lowering the prices for access over the current copper cables might make it more difficult to justify investment in fibre as the price differential would be substantial enough to deter consumer take up. the article indicates also that there is little sign of providers other than BT investing in fibre networks. Maybe the old idea of telecoms as a natural monopoly is not too far from the mark, at least at the network level?
On a somewhat related point, OFCOM have published data indicating that 8 million of the UK's 20 million broadband connections are provided by means of local loop unbundling (the providers have effectively taken over the lines from BT exchanges to their users' premises. That is about 40%. 70% of users access the Internet through providers other than BT. The remaining 30% of connections are based on providers purchasing capacity from BT on a wholesale basis and effectively rebranding the service.
Perhaps there is an argument in favour of access-level nationalisation, with a central fund paying for core infrastructure, which can then be used by access providers. Rather than having operators building out their own networks (or renting from BT), and four masts appearing to cover a location rather than just one, we have one common network infrastructure, and service providers renting bandwidth; since this would demand less spend on networks per operator, perhaps we would see lower prices *and* greater innovation.
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