reality BYTES
By Adrian Weckler
Attention, long-suffering Irish broadband users: there is a glimmer of hope. That glimmer was glimpsed last week in Dun Laoghaire, Co Dublin, where subscribers to UPC’s broadband service got a pleasant surprise – speeds of over 150 megabits per second (Mbs).
No, that’s not a misprint: UPC’s subscribers saw their service bumped up to record speeds of over 100Mbs.
The service is probably a trial and the subscribers, who only officially signed up for 30Mbs, cannot reasonably expect to continue receiving such exalted service.
But it shows that the company has the pipes to deliver ultra-fast broadband to ordinary households. UPC, the company behind NTL and Chorus, has long promised a consumer and small business service that would deliver this. It looks like it means to keep its word.
Such speeds were previously unimaginable in Ireland, a country where most broadband connections are still below 2Mbs, according to a recent Oxford study of European broadband performance.
In Europe, Scandinavia and France lead the broadband tables, with average connection speeds of at least 20Mbs.Britain lags some way, with an average connection speed of under 5Mbs. Should UPC follow through with its 100Mbs broadband plans, it could lift Ireland far above the EU average, something that was scarcely credible a short time ago.
As last week’s signals from Dun Laoghaire suggest, the signs are that UPC intends to proceed at full pace. It has committed to investing a further €90 million in its broadband network in 2010, according to company executives.
UPC’s footprint for this service will cover Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Galway and Waterford, and will also be available in 14 of the country’s largest towns. Presuming this happens, it will throw down a massive challenge to existing fixed-line operators, especially those using copper wire. Can those operators match UPC’s investment?
Do they see a market that will lead to a return on that investment? The longer that that question is not addressed, the harder it will be to catch up.
At present, the fastest widely available broadband service is a 24Mbs copper fixed line product, offered by Eircom and some of its rivals. But without further investment, that is the limit possible for the majority of customers using this technology. Mobile operators are unlikely to be affected as directly.
Their broadband dongles, capable of speeds up to about 10Mbs (at their peak), are largely used as mobile broadband devices for laptops. At €20 per month, they are often used as a low cost, flexible option.
Nevertheless, mobile operators retain ambitions of high-speed broadband themselves. This, it is promised, will come in the guise of 4G, also generally referred to as Long Term Evolution (LTE). Initial speeds talked about are between 30Mbs and 40Mbs. However, Irish operators say that its deployment is at least another year off.
How will this affect longsuffering rural broadband users? The unfortunate answer is that it won’t. While urban Ireland races ahead with broadband speeds at relatively affordable prices, rural Ireland will likely be stuck with slow, regional services or the government’s National Broadband Scheme.
Under the latter project, speeds are not guaranteed beyond 1Mbs.
