2019.11.22 – Open Broadband News

Broadband investment going Éire and Éire with new national contract

Taoiseach Leo Varadkar hailed the “biggest investment in rural Ireland ever” as he announced the signing of the contract for the National Broadband Plan at an event in Glendalough Co Wicklow.

Varadkar said the project, which will see high-speed fiber broadband connections brought to over half a million remote homes and premises over the next seven years, was the “most important since rural electrification”.

“We will ensure that rural Ireland has a 21st century future,” he said.

The contract with National Broadband Ireland, the company led by US businessman David McCourt and which has been dogged by controversy for several years, was finally signed after the Cabinet approved the deal at an early morning meeting in Government Buildings.

Operators increasingly coaxed into fiber investment

Like staunch health food advocates, cable operators are increasingly adopting high-fiber diets for their own good.

Even if they haven’t yet embraced FTTH or Fiber Deep strategies yet, cablecos are steadily pumping more fiber into their access networks even while they carry out such other key network upgrades as rolling out the latest versions of DOCSIS, tinkering with distributed access architecture (DAA) and experimenting with virtualizing network functions. Similar to the telcos and other rival service providers, they are fortifying themselves with fiber to add more capacity, deliver more advanced services, slash operational costs and boost service performance and reliability, among other things.

Yet, even while they fancy fiber more than ever, operators are not exactly abandoning their large legacy, coaxial plant or kissing DOCSIS and other cable-specific technologies goodbye. Instead, they are increasingly becoming hybrid service providers, relying on a growing mix of coax, fiber and wireless networks to serve their customers.

These trends and more come through clearly in the latest Heavy Reading survey of cable operators about their fiber use, plans, prospects and challenges.

IoT usage Españ-sion reported by Telefónica

Telefónica has presented its second study on the Internet of Things (IoT), Things Matter 2019: the experience of the IoT user in Spain, which covers both what users really think about the IoT and the voice of those responsible for digital transformation of industrial, commercial or institutional activity in companies from different sectors.

As Vicente Muñoz, global manager of IoT Telefónica, pointed out, “the essence of the second edition of this report is to provide greater understanding about the relationship between users and connected things; to continue contributing to the commitment of all of us who participate in the IoT revolution, whatever role we play in it. In short, to continue discovering the new possibilities that connected things give us in this world, which is undergoing a complete transformation.”

One of the main conclusions of Things Matter 2019 is that almost half of the population already knows what the IoT means and the desire to acquire and use IoT devices or solutions is growing, especially if they meet user expectations.

Nokia and VMware expand partnership to ease large-scale, multi-cloud operations

Nokia and VMware have expanded their partnership to include the development of integrated solutions to support Communications Service Providers’ (CSPs) drive for operational improvements and cost efficiency through large-scale, multi-cloud operations.

After years of working with virtual or cloud-based network functions in limited production deployments, CSPs need to build out these functions at scale to handle the increasing use of new data-intensive applications for tomorrow’s 5G and edge computing use cases. Success of this strategy is dependent on seamless interoperability and efficient operations of cloud-based network functions.

VMware and Nokia have a broad mutual customer base globally, across both companies’ portfolios. Through the expanded partnership, the two companies will advance the interoperability between Nokia software applications and VMware’s Telco Cloud, including VMware vCloud NFV. Nokia and VMware will also increase their investments in a deeper partnership with technology collaboration and advanced research & development to develop integrated solutions.

Swedes recommend fiber going fjord-ward as they take Stock of broadband expansion

Swedish local network association SSNf said a report that it commissioned from state research institute RISE has found there is a risk to expanding broadband services using wireless networks rather than by extending fiber. It said this would make it difficult for rural residents and businesses to use digital services.

The report said the various methods differ by investment cost but also by capacity. It said a wireless network with capacity anywhere close to the national target of 1 Gbps would require greater spending than continuing with fiber expansion would. Substitutes that require lower investment would not meet the demands of the national goal.

SSNf said that in the last 20 years, the public purse has spent billions on broadband development, with high targets set. Other residents and businesses in the countryside need the same opportunities, otherwise there is the risk of a digital divide, said CEO Mikael Ek.

The report adds that homes and businesses need guaranteed fast speeds for both downloads and uploads, in order to be able to benefit from new digital services, such as social services and to align business with environmental goals.

Are EU seeing what I’m seeing? Broadband drives record growth

Driven by rising consumer demand for broadband services, European Union cable market revenue rose to a record high of 24 billion euros in 2018, up three percent from 23.3 billion euros in 2017.

The all-time-high revenue results were propelled by continued growth in the total number of cable Revenue Generating Units (RGUs) in the EU, according to the European Broadband Cable Yearbook offered by Cable Europe and IHS Markit Technology, now a part of Informa Tech. Regional RGUs increased by about 1 million in 2018 to reach an annual high of 121.7 million, up from 120.6 million in 2017. The majority of the RGU growth originated from the broadband sector, where consumers are continuing to add subscriptions to cable internet services.

“Carrying on the trend from 2017, broadband remained the primary growth engine for the European Union cable business in 2018, generating new RGUs and spurring the market’s revenue expansion,” said Maria Rua Aguete, Executive Director of Media, Service Providers and Platforms for IHS Markit | Technology. “European cable operators have successfully diversified their offerings into complete bundles of video, voice and internet services. This has positioned them to capitalize on the voracious consumer appetite for broadband.”

If a Picture is Worth a Thousand Words – What is an Infographic Worth?

We recently shared with you a new report published by Maravedis LLC – ‘Managed Home Wi-Fi Networks for the Smart Home 2020-2025’ –. Many Broadband Forum members participated in this research, focused on managing the quality of the broadband experience in the home. Maravedis has shared an infographic summarizing key findings can be seen below:

Mersh Ado About Virtualizing – Listen to Broadband Forum CEO in Broadband Bunch podcast

While at Broadband World Forum 2019 last month, Broadband Forum CEO Robin Mersh sat down with ETI Software and The Broadband Bunch to discuss the need for service providers and vendors to collaborate and cooperate across the network ecosystem to drive agile innovation that adds services and thus revenue. The podcast also spoke with Aseem Parikh, VP of Solutions & Partnerships, Open Networking Forum (ONF).

With all the talk about NFV and SDN, the ‘Open Software & Standards, New Services, Added Revenue’ podcasts explore how these two non-profit organizations cut through the hype and are on separate but not different missions to enable service providers to deliver innovative services that will ultimately increase subscriber satisfaction and higher revenues.

Listen to the podcast featuring Robin Mersh here: https://soundcloud.com/broadband-bunch/eti-bb-bbwf-pt3 

Vendors Assemble! Broadband Forum wants YOU to participate in 5G premises project

The Broadband Forum Wireline and Wireless Convergence (WWC) Work Area is moving forward with specifying a new class of Customer Premises Equipment (CPE) – the 5G-RG.  The Work Area Leaders from Deutsche Telkom, Ericsson and Juniper are offering a briefing update to Members and non-Members of the Broadband Forum to learn more about the roadmap of this important work.

The 5G-RG will be designed to specifically integrate with a 5G core by employing a 5G signaling stack and possibly providing support for devices using 3GPP procedures in the home. It may also have a fixed WAN interface, LTR or NR WAN interface or both fixed and wireless interfaces for hybrid access.

CPE vendors are encouraged to learn more and are requested to participate in the project to ensure that the specifications ultimately generated are clear in order to facilitate simple implementation and provide important input and advice in regard to technical choices.

Vendors who decide to participate will be given opportunities for downstream deployment options and networking opportunities with other vendors in the WWC ecosystem. As the work evolves, interoperability and certification options will also be explored.

The work already involves major carriers in each of the Asian, North American and European markets.

To schedule a 30-minute briefing, please reach out to rheier@broadband-forum.org with your availability and time zone.