The Supreme Council of Information and Communication Technology (ictQATAR) announced on March 28, 2011 that Qatar’s government has established a new company - Qatar National Broadband Network Company (Q.NBN) – with a mandate to accelerate the rollout of a nationwide, open, and accessible high-speed broadband Fiber to the Home (FTTH) network.

Q.NBN will provide fiber access to citizens and businesses across Qatar, achieving coverage targets in excess of 95 percent by 2015. The resulting high-speed broadband connectivity will enable the effective use of multimedia and communications applications that are central to developing Qatar’s knowledge economy.
“The Qatar National Broadband Network represents a bold step forward in Qatar’s drive to be a leading knowledge economy. Ubiquitous access to a high-speed network is essential to business development, economic growth, innovation and enhanced government services for our citizens.  This network will do more than connect Qatar to the world; it will truly help enrich the lives of those who live here,” said Dr. Hessa Al-Jaber, Secretary General, ictQATAR.

 

See Press Release 
Source: ictQATAR

 

Venezuelan state-owned telco, Compania Anonima Nacional Telefonos de Venezuela (CANTV), announced on Friday that it has finished building a fibre-optic cable linking the southern part of the country to northern Brazil. Officials revealed the news at a press conference broadcast on state-run television, following the completion of the rollout of optical fibre across the border to the city of Manaus in Brazil, via small Venezuelan city Santa Elena de Uairen.

The link will support transmission of broadband internet with a maximum capacity of 10Gbps. According to Venezuela's Ministry of Science, Technology and Intermediate Industries, the country has around 10,700km of state-controlled fibre-optic infrastructure, and over the next two years the backbone is expected to reach 18,000km; the ministry added that the fibre network has been enlarged by 20% over the last two years.

See Press Release
Source: TeleGeography

ARCEP note the publication of its decision on the terms and methods for deploying and accessing ultra high-speed optical fibre electronic communications lines in very densely populated areas, in the Official Journal of 17 January 2010. Derived from this decision and a recommendation which has also been made public, the regulatory framework will help to stimulate investments in very densely populated areas in France, and to put the principle of infrastructure sharing into practice on a large scale. Operators now have one month to publish their access offers, detailing the technical and pricing terms of their current and future, shared fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) network rollouts. As called upon to do so by the Prime Minister, ARCEP will continue its efforts in this area, and aims to complete the regulatory framework that will govern rollouts outside of very densely populated areas in 2010. Some of the provisions contained in the decision published today in fact apply to the entire country, notably the obligation to provide a passive access offer from the shared access point and the principles concerning pricing

See Press Release

Source: ARCEP

The French telecoms regulator, ARCEP, sets out the terms and conditions for access to inhouse fibre wiring in France. The proposed access regulation is to be imposed simultaneously on all operators rolling out fibre lines into the homes of consumers, regardless of whether these operators – also referred to as in-building operators – have significant market power or not. ARCEP intends to oblige all in-building operators to provide access to its in-building fibre network to alternative operators. This way, French consumers will be able to choose between several competing providers of high speed internet connections.

See Details
Source: Europe's Information Society

A recent study of the Columbia Business School calculates the impact of investment in broadband technology on employment and economic output.  

According to the study, some EUR 36 billion of investment will be fulfilled under the National Broadband Strategy of Germany by 2020. This investment is expected to create close to a million jobs from broadband construction and network effects between 2010-2020. In addition, this investment will result in over EUR170 billion in incremental GDP over the same period.

The full paper and the summary are available online.

Source: Columbia Business School

The Ghanaian government has signed a Memorandum of Understanding on the interconnection of fibre optic networks with Burkina Faso to enhance communications between the two west African neighbours. The Ghanaian communications minister has said the signing of the MOU is in line with the commitment of ECOWAS member states to foster economic integration.

Ghana and Burkina Faso also declared their determination to prioritise their optic fibre development plans to achieve interconnection by 2010.

See Press Release
Source: BalancingAct-Africa

One of Africa’s largest countries, the Democratic Republic of Congo, has taken the first towards creating a fibre link to its neighbours and the outside world. A little-noticed announcement was made at the end of last month by the Vice-First Minister for Reconstruction that gave the green light to start construction work on a fibre optic link from the capital Kinshasa to the coastal town of Muanda.

The Vice First-Minister for Reconstruction Emile Bongeli announced at the end of February 2009 the first phase of construction of a national fibre backbone with the building of a Muanda-Kinshasa link in partnership with China.

See Press Release
Source: Balancingact-africa

As the demand for communication technology continues to grow in Africa, incumbent Malawi Telecommunications Limited (MTL) is intensifying efforts to speed up laying of underground fibre-optic cables throughout the country with a view to boast free flow of information. Malawi is keen to ensure that it is easy to connect and inter-link with the world as far as information technology is concerned, and more importantly to enable the country to compete with the rest of the continent and the world at large.

It is estimated that a total of US$30 million would be required for the ambitious project in Malawi in order to replace its VSAT links. MTL’s Lester Tandwe, said the latest development sought to keep the country moving with the times in the field of information and technology.

“The first part of the capable will be operational by April 2009 while the second part will be operational by 2010 and will connect to international cables to provide international bandwidth,” said Tandwe. Given growing user demand in technology, Malawi is now laying an average of 50 kilometres of underground capable with a view to provide internet and telecommunication services to both urban and the countryside.

See Press Release
Source: Balancingact-africa

La Comisión del Mercado de las Telecomunicaciones (CMT) ha aprobado una propuesta de regulación para los servicios mayoristas de banda ancha y las redes físicas de telecomunicaciones, que incluyen la red de cobre y los despliegues de fibra óptica o redes de nueva generación. Esta propuesta será enviada a Bruselas, la Comisión Nacional de Competencia, el Gobierno y al conjunto del sector, que tendrán un mes para presentar comentarios y alegaciones antes de que la CMT tenga lista la regulación definitiva, prevista para diciembre de 2008.

See Press Release
Source: Comisión del Mercado de las Telecomunicaciones (CMT)

The first part of the consultation covers the role of the building operator, who is the player authorised to install and operate fibre in the private property. This operator’s responsibilities have to be defined concerning the installation of the optical fibre to the benefit of residents and the implementation of sharing to allow competition.
The second part of the consultation deals with the agreement practice between operators and building owners or managers. Until now, there has been a real grab bag of practices only partially meet the guarantee expectations of building owners and managers, especially as concerns the quality of work, connection of the building to a very-high-speed network, and the implementation of sharing by operators to allow residents to benefit from competition. By submitting a model agreement to public consultation, ARCEP hopes to encourage a climate of trust between operators and property players, so that operators can deploy fibre as quickly as possible. Until the law and application texts can be adopted, the model agreement includes a commitment to sharing by the operator, as per ARCEP’s recommendations.
The third part of the consultation covers the degree of sharing of the fibre local loop among operators, which raises the question of the location of the sharing point. While sharing of the fibre located on private property is necessary, its provision at the edge of the private property isn’t a sufficient answer in itself. In particular, if sharing were done solely at the building, not all buildings could be connected by all operators at the same tine, so that residents would have less selection, at least initially.

See Press release
Source: ARCEP

Minister of Communications and Information Technology Dr. Tarek Kamel and that of Local Development General Abdel-Salam Mohamed Mahgoub witnessed today the signing of a cooperation agreement between National Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (NTRA) and Local Development Ministry on the second landline network operations.

The agreement aims to set and unify the procedures of carrying out the operations required for establishing the second landline network infrastructure across Egypt.

See Press Release
Source: National Telecommunications Regulatory Authority - NTRA

The 8^th Global Symposium for Regulators took place from 11 to 13 March 2008 in Pattaya, Thailand. This major ITU event focused on best practices in regulatory measures to foster and encourage sharing of infrastructure resources as a means of stimulating investment and growth in the ICT sector.

Ten discussion papers were developed for this year's GSR:

1. What do we mean by 6 Degrees of Sharing?
2. Extending Open Access to National Fibre Backbones in Developing Countries
3. International Gateway Liberalization: the Singapore experience
4. Breaking Up is Hard to Do: The Emergence of Functional Separation as a Regulatory Remedy
5. Mobile Sharing
6. Spectrum Sharing
7. WRC-07 Results and Impact on Terrestrial Broadband Wireless Access Systems
8. End-User Sharing
9. International Mobile Roaming Regulation – An Incentive for Cooperation
10. IPTV and Mobile TV: New Challenges for Regulators

Comments are welcome by 13 April 2008 at: gsr08@itu.int.   

More information on the event as well as the presentations from the panel sessions can be found at the GSR 2008 website.

See: Press release 

Source: ITU

Due to cooperation with one of development companies, TP Group has installed an optical fibre infrastructure in a new building in the Wola district in Warsaw. This will make it possible to activate the tp multipackage together with the 50/10 Mb/s Internet access technical pilot in the FTTH technology (Fibre to the Home).

See Press Release
Source : TP

El Consejo de la CMT ha adoptado una decisión sobre las líneas maestras de la regulación que aplicará a las Redes de Acceso de Nueva Generación (NGA). El objetivo de la CMT es incentivar la inversión y la innovación tecnológica de los operadores en el despliegue de redes de fibra óptica, promover el desarrollo de una competencia efectiva y sostenible, así como garantizar la inversión en infraestructuras llevada a cabo por los competidores del operador tradicional.

See Press Release
Source: Comisión del Mercado de las Telecomunicaciones (CMT)

Teletrans, the communications subsidiary of Romania’s Transelectrica, has awarded Alcatel-Lucent a contract to deploy IP/MPLS (multi protocol label switching) technology. The deal will form the basis of Teletrans’ nationwide optical network expansion and optimisation, according.

See More
Source : TeleGeography

Algérie Télécom is  first African telecoms operator with a business strategy including Fibre-To-The-Home. Although the price of connecting households to fibre has dropped, it still remains an expensive way to provide a local connection but it creates a large user base for forthcoming triple play offer.

See More
Source: Balancing Act

ARCEP published today the results of two public consultations and directions about very high bandwidth in France. Very high bandwidth is an inescapable technological evolution in the medium term. Major French players have announced fibre deployments. Investments are significant and will need to be spread over several years. The concern is to ensure that this investment is borne by all operators as much as possible. But for the Authority, legislative measures are needed as require operators to share the last part of their fibre network and to be sure that access to France Telecom’s civil engineering must be guaranteed to allow all operators to invest.

Press Release and documents

Source: ARCEP

On 4 September 2007 ITU has released a major publication, Trends in Telecommunication Reform: the Road to NGN. This is the 8^th of a series of reports focusing on the ongoing transformation in the telecom/ICT sector to inform regulators and policy makers around the world.

During the past week, the report got news coverage by numerous leading national and international media, witnessing the interest of the ten chapters of research and analysis dedicated to issues related to the transition towards Next Generation Networks (NGN). You can find links to some of the news reports in the attached document.

More information about the 2007 report is available at the “On the Road to NGN” website.

The publication is available for sale at the ITU bookshop.

Geneva, 4 September 2007 — ITU has released a major publication, Trends in Telecommunication Reform: the Road to NGN. In its 8th edition, Trends reports on the evolution of circuit-switched telecommunication into "next-generation" networks, as operators around the world fight to remain competitive. The Report aims at enabling regulators and policy-makers in developing countries to better understand the changes transforming the ICT sector so they can evolve their policy and regulatory frameworks to leverage today’s technological and market developments.

What does NGN mean for regulators? They have many choices to make. Some view NGN as the intersection of the telecom and Internet worlds. If so, which regulatory regime should apply? The current heavily-regulated telecom regulatory model? The lightly-regulated Internet model? Or some new hybrid model? The migration to NGN affords an opportunity for regulators to analyze current practices and revise them in light of what makes sense going forward. This Trends report offers a detailed discussion of the kinds of measures that are needed to ensure that regulation keeps pace with technological and market developments so that the best of NGN is available to all of the world’s people.

The ITU press release is available in Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish.

More information about the content of the 2007 report is available at the “On the Road to NGN” website.

The publication is available for sale at the ITU bookshop.

The Australian Communications and Media Authority today declared protection zones around two submarine telecommunications cables of national significance off the coast of Sydney, NSW. The protection zones will take effect on 1 October 2007.

Activities that could damage the cables are restricted or prohibited within protection zones, and significant criminal penalties apply for breaches of the legislation.

These are the first such protection zones to be declared and are the culmination of extensive consultation over the past 12 months with affected and potentially affected parties. ACMA has established a new international benchmark by creating protection zones that safeguard submarine cables and place appropriate restrictions on other activities occurring in their vicinity. Full Press Release

Source: ACMA, Australia

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New Delhi, 07 June, 2007- Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has released Regulation on " International Telecommunication Access to Essential Facilities at Cable Landing Stations Regulations, 2007" which provides for the non-discriminatory, fair and open access at the cable landing stations.

A number of submarine cables are landing or terminating in India. These submarine cables terminate at cable landing stations operated and managed by few ILDOs. As such the facilities are predominantly owned by limited number of ILDOs. TRAI considers that access to these cable landing stations by other licensees is necessary for creating a conducive environment and boosting competition in the international bandwidth connectivity / leased circuits segment.

Access to submarine Cable Landing Stations (CLS) is considered an essential input for many telecom services needing international connectivity. Any access barriers to such facility can constrain the competitiveness of telecom operators and become detrimental to healthy growth of international telecom market. Thus for the CLS, which are considered to be essential and critical telecom facilities, it needs to be ensured that any restriction on such facilities should not become a ‘bottleneck’ to international telecom services provision. In pursuance of the recommendations on "Measures to promote competition in International Private Leased Circuits (IPLC) in India", the Department of Telecommunications, after accepting the recommendations, has also amended the relevant clauses in International Long Distance (ILD) Service Licence to ensure efficient, transparent and non-discriminatory access facilities for submarine cables at Cable Landing Stations.

International leased circuits are used by exporters, BPO units/ Call centers, banks, small and medium enterprises (SMEs), ISPs and other information technology enabled service providers. In addition, ILDOs also require international bandwidth connectivity for carrying international voice calls. The Regulation would facilitate:

• provisioning of bandwidth to end consumers at competitive rates;

• boosting of competition and therefore reduction in the price of international private leased circuits (IPLCs);

• availability of International bandwidth at competitive price to ISPs for rapid growth of Broadband Service;

• options to ILDOs to purchase International bandwidth at competitive prices on a range of diversified submarine cables;

• carriage of voice/data at a competitive cost.

The owners of Cable Landing Stations are mandated, from the date of commencement of the Regulation, to submit "Cable Landing Station – Reference Interconnect Offer (CLS-RIO)" containing the terms and conditions of Access Facilitation and Co-location facilities including landing facilities at cable landing stations for International submarine cable capacity in accordance with the specified schedule and provisions in the Regulation within 30 days to the Authority for its approval. The Authority shall approve the CLS – RIO within 60 days. However, if it requires modifications so as to protect the interests of service providers or consumers or to promote orderly growth of the telecom, the Authority will give an opportunity to the owner of Cable Landing Station (CLS) to make necessary modifications and submit within 15 days of receipt of requirement for such modifications in the CLS-RIO for the approval. The owner of CLS shall publish the approved CLS-RIO within 15 days from the date of approval by the Authority. The Regulation would enable the timely provision of International bandwidth connectivity at cable landing stations in a fair, equitable, transparent and non discriminatory manner to eligible International Telecommunication Entities i.e. International Long Distance Operators (ILDOs) and Internet Service Providers (ISPs) with International Gateway permission.

The Regulation provides the time limits for owner of Cable Landing Station for various activities in access facilitation including the provision for co-location facility and the Regulation also provides the time limits for eligible Indian International Telecom Entity to enter into agreement, make payments and arrange backhaul circuits to its premises from Cable Landing Station. The Regulation has a provision for a minimum commitment period of three years for Co-location facility and its renewal till the term of lease of International capacity on submarine cable at cable landing station subject to no default and breach by eligible Indian International Telecom Entity.

The Authority is of the view that there is a need for standard/published access facilitation agreement, which the new service providers can make use of for availing of access to international submarine cable capacity. In the absence of such regulation, there is a scope for delay, in provisioning of access to the capacity acquired by the competing operators, from incumbent International Long Distance Operator (ILDO) and other ILDOs with Significant Market Power (SMP) who own cable landing stations. The Authority also noted that problems have been faced by

some of the ILDOs, who had acquired capacity in a submarine cable system from foreign carriers or International Telecom carriers, desired to access such capacity at the cable landing station of an existing operator.

The highlights of Regulation are:

(a) new service providers have access to the International bandwidth capacity in the same way as the consortium members;

(b) access facilitation is not unduly delayed by consortium members having control over CLS;

(c) transparent and non-discriminatory access at cable landing stations;

(d) well defined responsibilities in terms of functioning;

(e) transparent charges for access, Co-location and landing facilities;

(f) time limit for provision of access, Co-location and landing facilities.

Full text of the "International Telecommunication Access to Essential Facilities at Cable Landing Stations Regulations, 2007 (5 of 2007)" is available on TRAI’s website: www.trai.gov.in

Source: TRAI, India

 

In recent months, major French operators have announced and begun implementing plans to deploy very high-speed access networks in Paris and in certain other large cities.

These initiatives are a part of the continuing dynamic of the high-speed market and put France ahead of its European counterparts. In order to facilitate the efficiency of investments to the benefit of consumers, ARCEP wishes to contribute to the emergence of a framework which is favourable to the development of very high speed. In the next few months, it considers it necessary to go further in depth into two subjects: operator access to ducts and the sharing of the terminal part of networks.

Favouring operator deployments by sharing ducts

The total renewal of the copper local loop with fibre optic local loops requires an investment of tens of billions of euros. Civil engineering costs and the laying of ducts represent more than half of the cost of building a new fixed local loop. Under these circumstances, the possibility of using civil engineering infrastructures (ducts, rooms) is a key factor in operators’ economic equation.

A number of projects are underway in this sense:

First, the Comité des Réseaux d'Initiative Publique (CRIP), a forum for discussion and exchange between ARCEP, local governments and operators, is examining how local governments might intervene in favour of very high speed, such as laying extra ducts during roadworks and leasing them to operators.

=> Points of reference will be published before the end of the year

Next, ARCEP has initiated works to evaluate the advisability and feasibility of regulating the incumbent’s ducts. Indeed, in 1996, France Telecom received the ownership of several hundreds of thousands of kilometres of ducts installed for the telephone and cable plan networks. These infrastructures are only partly occupied and could facilitate the deployment of fibre optic networks.

Such regulation concentrated on the lowest network layers would help to stimulate operator investments by reducing regulation needs on higher layers: fibre network architecture, structure and pricing of activated offers, etc.

=> This summer, ARCEP will submit a market analysis for public consultation bearing on the competitive situation of ducts and their possible regulation

Sharing the terminal part of networks to avoid creating local monopolies

It is indispensable that the terminal part of networks be shared:

• to limit disruptions in apartment buildings and houses by avoiding having different operators lay networks
• to let inhabitants put competition into play between very high speed service providers without being held captive by the first operator to have wired their building

It appears that operators having begun deploying fibre networks in apartment buildings have already told owners and managers that their networks are "shareable".

However, to date, their access or sharing offers have neither been published nor been notified to ARCEP. Some building managers have wondered about this situation.

=> In order to provide transparent information to various players, ARCEP invites operators deploying very high speed networks to send in their technical and pricing offer for access to the terminal part of their network by the end of the month.

ARCEP will pay very special attention to the technical specifications of interfaces, provision tariffs, location of interconnection points, related connection services to interconnection points and equipment hosting.

=> A document submitted for public consultation will then explain the main conditions necessary for the terminal part of a fibre network to be effectively shared by the various very high speed operators under reasonable technical and economic conditions.

***

In order to coordinate the various works in progress, a very high speed project leader has been designed at ARCEP. This position will be held by Sébastien Soriano, head of the FTTx and unbundling unit.

Source: ARCEP

Kurth: "We want equal opportunities and planning foundations for

infrastructure investment in new broadband access networks"

The Federal Network Agency today published a draft on the market definition and market analysis for the field of access to the local loop, market 11 of the EU Commission’s market recommendation. In doing so, it meets its legal obligation to have the results of the previous ruling by the President's Chamber reviewed every 2 years. For the first time, the draft of a regulatory order for market 11 of the EU Commission’s recommendation is being published for consultation at the same time as the draft of the market definition and market analysis.

The draft of the market definition and market analysis is based on the decisions mady by the Federal Network Agency so far. It states that the current subscriber network covers connections between the main distributor and the network termination unit as a rule for the provision of subscriber accesses. Access to the access network is generally provided at the main distributor as a network-sided termination device, but according to the requirement for unbundling, it can also be provided at a point located closer to the network termination unit (for example at the cable distributor). The draft concludes that Deutsche Telekom AG (DT AG) still has substantial market power.

In addition, the Federal Network Agency raises questions that may be relevant to the implementation of broadband services with very high transmission rates, should this necessitate expansion or restructuring of the local loop network.

This requires the connections between the main distributor and cable distributor, which currently use copper wires, to be bridged in parallel or exclusively using fiberoptic cables as in the case of the VDSL access network.

The draft of the regulatory order plans to maintain the current obligations for access to the local loop and include access to cable ducts between the cable distributors and the main distributor of DT AG as well. This new obligation is intended to enable competitors to connect local loops to their own fiber optic cable infrastructures for, in particular, broadband use of local loops, as DT AG has done or plans to do to a large extent as part of its VDSL expansion.

Source: Bundesnetzagentur, Germany

 

THE Tanzania Telecommunications Limited (TTCL) will next year install a new generation network in Zanzibar, to improve its telecommunication system in the isles. This was said when the TTCL Board of Directors met President Amani Abeid Karume in Zanzibar yesterday.

The president expressed his satisfaction on the job already done by TTCL in the isles, pointing out that the notable achievements in the sector would be of great assistance to the people. He said that the achievements attained so far were results of good policies put in place by both the union and Zanzibar governments, to ensure that people get sufficient telecommunication services, in support of their efforts to improve the country's economy.

The president further expressed hopes that the connection of "Fibre Optic cable" that would connect key areas in the country would hasten economic developments. According to him, the new thrust of the company should now focus on expansion of the new modern network in order to fulfil current and future needs of customers together with national technology, information and communications.

The Chairman of the TTCL's Board of Directors, Prof. Mapunda, assured the president that the company would continue to improve telecommunications services in the isles. He pointed out that improvement of the Kijangwani station has already been completed.

Improvement of the Chakechake station, according to him, would follow and that there was another project being undertaken at Mkoani side with a view to satisfy the customers' requirements in the country.

Source: DailyNews, Tanzania

Hong Kong’s telecoms regulator OFTA has awarded Tricom Asia an External Fixed Telecommunications Network Services (EFTNS) licence, giving it the right to operate international facilities-based telecoms services via its 1,050km undersea fibre-optic cable, VN-HK, linking Hong Kong and Vietnam, which is currently under construction. According to the carrier, it is the sole new EFTNS licensee in Hong Kong since China Telecom won a concession in 2005. Operating via three offices in Stockholm, Hong Kong and Hanoi, Tricom Asia is focused on investing in telecommunication solutions in emerging markets in the Asia Pacific regionl; it established its Hong Kong division in 2003.

Source: Telegeography

Denmark is helping with a fibre-optic deployment in Mozambique, signing an agreement for a EUR15 million grant to help finance the second phase of the country’s National Fibre-Optic Transmission Network. Mozambique’s Agencia de Informaçao reports that the rollout will begin in April or May 2007 and will connect the northern cities of Cuamba, Lichinga, Nampula and Pemba, and will also include a link between the central cities of Chimoio, Tete and Caia. The deployment is being carried out by national PTO Telecomunicações de Moçambique (TDM).

Source: Telegeography

Indonesia’s dominant telecoms company PT Telekomunikasi Indonesia (Telkom) says it will take part in the country’s proposed fibre-optic network construction tender which is valued at USD1.5 billion and expected to be launched in October next year. Telkom managing director Arwin Rasyid confirmed his company’s interest, adding he was still considering the best options for Telkom to take part in the process. Speaking to reporters in Jakarta, Rasyid said: ‘Whether or not we form a consortium, Telkom will certainly play a large role in constructing the fibre-optic network’, adding that one aim would be to increase the capacity of the incumbent’s network at the same time to support increased demand both for itself and its subsidiaries such as mobile arm Telkomsel and PT Telkom Vision, a pay-TV broadcast provider.

Source: Telegeography