About a week ago ICF announced next year’s (2010) smart21 cities. 7 of these cities will be awarded the Intelligent Community award in January. According to ICF, “Intelligent Communities are those which have – whether through crisis or foresight – come to understand the enormous challenges of the Broadband Economy, and have taken conscious steps to create an economy capable of prospering in it. They are not necessarily big cities or famous technology hubs. They are located in developing nations as well as industrialized ones, suburbs as well as cities, the hinterland as well as the coast.”

Trikala, the host city of Broadband Cities 2008, is included for the second consequtive year in the top 21 cities. I look forward to see more cities from Greece joining the list in the future. Having visited Trikala last year, I have to admit that the broadband efforts of the municipal executives have an apparent effect to the citizens and the cultural life of the city. Trikala is one the few cities in the periphery of the country that do feel comfortable with broadband.

The time is here. I am flying to St. Petersburg on Sunday morning, so early that I think it may be late Saturday night! I am speaking at ICUMT 2009 (12-14 Oct), an international conference, sponsored by IEEE for researchers, engineers, network planners and service providers in telecommunications targeted on newly emerging systems, standards, services, and applications.

I will be presenting some of the earliest work I have been doing in NTUA/NETMODE on broadband opportunities (both in investing and managing) for municipalities. More specifically, I will present a business model, tailored for Greece based on a type of regional infrastructure companies established by neighbouring municipalities for managing municipal fiber MANs and expanding them to fiber access networks.

Since it was first envisioned, the model has gained acceptance among public executives in Greece. Regional broadband companies is currently the prime (if not the only) coordinated action plan from the national pioneers of municipal broadband.

So, if you follow this blog and are attending the conference drop me a note to meet up and discuss our fiber rich diet! Until then:

встретимся в Санкт-Петербурге!
Костас Трулос

The INFOSTRAG group organizes their 5th consecutive annual seminar in Syros. This year the seminar is entitled “Leveraging on ICT and Renewable Energy Sources for the Development of Islands and Remote Areas” and I am invited to discuss the policy implications of municipal involvement in NGA.

The seminar is planned for next weekend 9-12/7/2009. Should you be interested, here’s the full program, and note that registration is free.

I look forward to spend a weekend in the middle of the Aegean, surrounded by crystal seas and the blue sky with pleasant breezes of municipal NGA influxes… ‘nough said, I go pack my bags!

Some time ago I wrote about ArNET, the wireless network of the municipality of Argyroupolis. The project is intriguing by the fact that this is the only large scale municipal wireless network in Greece. So, I asked an interview with ArNET management and Mr. Stefanos Paschalides, General Manager of ArNET, and Mrs. Isidora Lazaridou, Development Advisor of ArNET gladly accepted my invitation.

The interesting thing in ArNET is that it was not financed by EU funds (something that has become a norm in the country, lately). ArNET is expecting a ROI in less than 1.5 year from now (much sooner than initially anticipated). The reason is that ArNET has contributed to significant economies of scope and cost reductions for other municipal ICT projects (e.g. e-training, e-learning, enabled municipal participation in National/European projects etc.)

Mr. Paschalides, thank you for giving me the opportunity to discuss with you the details of ArNET. Please introduce us to the network.

Stefanos Paschalides (SP): ArNET is a mesh wireless network that covers a large part of the city geography and provides access services to the citizens and visitors. It also complements the set of services offered by DEADA (ed. the municipal company running the network) to the municipal administration. The project primary goals are:

a) To address the lack of high-speed connections in the area which is the results of the bad quality of the copper network that is currently deployed in Argyroupolis
b) To facilitate interconnection of public services with commuting public servants (that may need to work outside of their offices
c) To enhance municipal inter-building communications

When did you envisage the creation of ArNET, and how did you put your plans into action?

SP: The project was envisaged back in 2006 and was influenced by the municipal network of Chaska, Minnesota, and the then plans of the city of Philadelphia for the creation of an analogous network. At the beginning, we ran a pilot from May to September 2006 that interconnected two municipal buildings and covered a small area of the city. The pilot was successful; therefore, DEADA took on the project to the next level. The first installations started in January 2007. The network deployment lasted until October 2007 and since then we operate in full.

That’s very fast, indeed.

SP: The interesting part is that the whole project was completed in almost 1.5 years, including preliminary studies, the preparation of the RfP, the tender and the selection process. The network is in operation since March 2007, 3 months after the installation of the first equipment. At the time, only 15% of the city was covered but ArNET, yet we already offered services.

We used the studies made in Chaska and Philadelphia, and we adjusted them to our case, for example, civil infrastructure and geographical particularities. For example, Argyroupolis lies on a hill side while Philadelphia is built in an area surrounded by hills. Chaska on the other hand is a very similar to Argyroupolis. They have the same more or less geography, size and population and additionally, both cities are using the same vendor – Tropos Networks.

So what is the technology that ArNET is based upon and what is the current coverage of the network?

SP: Now the network covers 75% of the city. Not all parts of the city have strong signal. There are still places in the city that the signal can be weak. For a passing-by user of the network that means that if he uses the network while driving he may experience some connection hick-ups when passing through areas with lower quality signal.

We use 2 types of access points: one that provides b/g type of Wi-Fi and another that provides a & b/g type of Wi-Fi. For backhaul interconnection we use directional Wi-Fi links. The backhaul network that aggregates the access points to the gateways operates at 9 meters above the ground. There is a second level of backhaul network that aggregates the gateways to the center of the network. This operates at higher ground, on top of the buildings…

…and who is servicing ArNET with Internet feed?

SP: We have an FTTB link at the network center. We started the network with Attika Telecommunications serving as our ISP. Last year we issued an RfP and HoL won the bid.

I understand that the network is a municipal service that offers broadband connections to the citizens. But can a commercial operator offer services over the municipal network on an open access principles?

SP: The issue was raised well before the installation of the network. There were two private commercial wireless networks operating in the area. Practically you can call us competitors. Of course, there is also AWMN which have a lot of members in Argyroupoli. Many members of AWMN are consulting DEADA and are customers too.

The primary concern of the city was not to create an infrastructure to share it with third parties. We want to be able to communicate over a municipal wireless network and secure our data, with the use of a VPN for that. Also, note that the capacity of the network at the moment is not sufficient to sustain operation of more networks on it. Last and not least, we do need to point out that we have not yet received an analogous proposition from an operator.

How about if an operator requested to use ArNET’s poles to place its equipment on?

SP: Still, we haven’t had a request like that until today. If it was to be made it is the city council’s decision. But I assume that if this was for the benefit of the area and its citizens, the council would approve it.

The reasons behind the creation of ArNEt are that citizens didn’t have good service with current ADSL network. We never tried to compete with telcos. We wanted to complement the ADSL service currently in place with a wireless alternative, exactly due to the low quality of the current fixed-line offerings.

Would you say that the limited quality of ADSL helped the network take-up rates?

SP: Certainly it did. Alimos (note: a neighboring municipality), has worse problems than we do in terms of ADSL quality and people subscriber to the network although the signal is much weaker.

What type of services do you offer? And how are they priced?

SP: Everyone can use the network, whether are citizens or city visitors. We offer a variety of speeds starting from as low as 384Kbps (for simple email usage or passing travelers) up to 2Mbps. The annual service fees start at 50 Euros and climbs up to 180 Euros for the greater speeds (VAT excluded). Our pricing is very competitive.

I must note here that we tried to avoid any costs associated with billing. The subscribers pay in advance the fee corresponding to their subscription period at our offices. When the subscription period is about to expire we inform our customers about it so that they have the time to decide if they wish to continue or not.

Have the citizens embraced the network? Since the time the network operates, what would you say about the public acceptance of the network?

Isidora Lazaridou (IL): They accept it and they want it. When they relocate, or when a building is constructed and they loose signal they assume the extra cost required to increase the quality of their connection in their new premise. Some spend up to 200 euros for that, when they could simply use their laptop. According to a recent survey, 70% of our customers are happy or very happy. The primary reason for dissatisfaction is the weakness of signal (2/5). After we deployed the full network customers join simply because they want to use the network outdoors, for example when in a café.

SP: We also didn’t have citizens that disapproved wireless antennas due to health issues. We showed them the technical study for the health concerns and we informed them about the necessary procedures should they wanted to file a report or should they wanted us to withdraw an antenna. For example, the municipal services which are responsible to deal with the matter etc.

Public health concerns regarding the use of wireless is an issue. You definitely need social skills to pull it through.

IL: Yes, municipalities have an advantage on this. Citizens trust much more the people that see every day in the public services, kiosks, people that they voted for and feel that they can listen to their needs and change things for the better. There are also citizens that exclaim that they are proud for the network, and they feel it their own. They see it to be part of the public property.

Have you faced any serious commercial or competition issues? The presence of such a large scale network in Athens do raise some issues.

SP: There is definitely a serious commercial angle here. However, there is \a market that is not captured by the commercial operators. Not everyone wants to have 2,5,10 MBps connections for their leisure or their business. For example, there is a housewife that wants to visit 5 blogs with recipes. She does not want to pay or 30 Euros per month for that. She simply wants to be able to pay 50 or 100 Euros per year, and that’s enough for her. This is excellent contribution of the network to fill the digital gap in our local community.

IL: You see, ArNET gives services to citizens that they wouldn’t otherwise be able to afford. That’s why you also see that low income families use it; because it’s cheap. In our marketing strategy, whoever has an ADSL connection and wants to use ArNET as a backup network, we offer a 20% off.

Most of the tax consultants in the areas are ArNET’s customers. This is because when in tax season, if they have a problem with their ADSL connection they are completely lost. They do need a backup alternative.

Do you advertise the network within the municipal limits? When I was in Trikala last year, everyone knew about the network. Despite any complains about it my feeling was that people considered the network to be “their own”, part of the public property.

SP: It is a huge project for a city like Trikala. For us it is simply another municipal service. Not because Argyroupoli is a better municipality than Trikala. It is simply because Argyroupoli is only a suburb of the capital and the needs are completely different. For example, if here citizens complain about not adequate ADSL speeds, the factories outside Trikala have no option for broadband (other than wireless).

Have you engaged in some sort of pubic-private partnership to operate the network?

SP: Yes, technical support is being done by an external associate. Also, network administration (software, NMS) is also outsourced to the local representative of Tropos Networks.

So you have kept management, marketing and billing in-house?

IL: And we also do the customer service/helpdesk and CPE installation. We do go to the customer. We show them how to connect; whether there is signal in their area etc. We also train people on how to use the wireless network.

How did you finance the deployment of ArNET?

SP: Finance did not come from EU funds. It was done through own capital. Currently all investments (plus advertizing) are in total 600.000 Euros. We expect the ROI in the next 18 months. This comes sooner that we have initially expected. It is due to the fact that the operation of ArNET enabled economies of scale and scope in other municipal activities. That is, the existence of infrastructure enables the municipality to cut costs, participate in projects that it would not be able to, without ArNET etc.

How do you see ArNET developing in the future? What you see your next steps to be?

SP: There are two neighboring municipalities that face similar broadband issues to Argyroupolis. These are the municipalities of Elliniko and Alimos. The mayors and public executives of these three municipalities already discuss the possibility to expand the network and essentially cover more than half of the south suburbs of the metropolitan area of Athens. We are currently exploring ways to finance the expansion.

We are also making efforts to increase the signal in our network and to implement new services. We have already implemented a tele-education service. Space is offered to any user of ArNET on this platform to store and share educational material. The most important thing is that when a school in the city goes for an educational trip in the proximity, the teachers and students can access educational resources on our platform on their laptops via ArNET.

There is still one last interesting initiative which you could also publish on your blog. Tropos Networks has extensive network deployments worldwide, for example GooglePlex. There is a scenario to create a digital European community of networks with similar infrastructures, based on Tropos equipment. Malta, Manchester, Tirana, Barcelona, several cities in germany, Kyparissia and Veroia, Metsovo are installing Tropos equipment and are thinking positively about it. Roaming services between the participating cities is one of the many practical services we could apply if/when our plans for a European digital community materialize.

I have one last thing to ask. If you were starting all over again, what you would change and would you keep the same?

SP: I would stick to our choices on hardware and software. We are very satisfied with the equipment used in our network and in our data center.

What we would do better is the network design. We would implement more wireless hot-spots with narrower coverage per hotspot and we would deploy a wider backhaul network. The backhaul implementation today limits the speeds offered to the end-users. With a larger number of aggregation points in the network we could offer services up to 4Mbps and compete directly with ADSL offerings in the area.

I guess, you will work on that while expanding the network.

SP: Of course, further development of the network will correct this issue.

Mr. Paschalides, Mrs Lazaridou, thank you very much.

SP: Thank you too

IL: Thank you.

A few weeks ago, Optronics announced the completion of the first FTTH pilot network in Greece, in the city of Karditsa. Optronics has also been awarded the construction of the city’s fiber MAN, funded under the Call 93 of Information Society Programm. The FTTH network in the city comes to underpin the city’s efforts for a fiber future.

Currently the pilot has only a few dozens connections in a small part of the city and offers only internet connectivity. However, the connection speeds are set to 1Gbps. My intimate sources say that no pricing or marketing strategies have been announced so far. The project is set to serve as a first/best practice for an FTTH project in the country and as a way to gain experience in FTTH deployments.

I will get back on this with more information. In the mean time, you can all update your fiber maps. Greece has FTTH!

I’ve read Rob Atksinson’s and George Ou’s article published in the latest FTTH Prism newsletter entitled “Why Municipal Fiber Hasn’t Succeeded“. The authors argue that municipal broadband has not been successful because municipal broadband initiatives have not proven to be financially viable. The argumentation is persuasive at first reading; however, I’d like to take a look at the issues surrounding the municipal broadband from a different point of view and comment on the major topics addressed in the article.

First off, the article concludes that municipal broadband networks are not successful primarily because a number of local initiatives shutdown or are near bankruptcy. I find this rather an oversimplification. Judging from the history of the telecommunications industry, it’s probably just too soon to conclude whether municipal broadband networks are proven to be non-economical. Investments in physical infrastructure require a significant payback period and long ROI and to be objective and fair with our assessment, we can only evaluate the municipal efforts after enough years of operation. Management can exercise significant flexibility to deal with uncertainty and unanticipated outcomes (e.g. low demand, regulatory intervention, competition reactions) and holds the power to revert the situation with appropriate measures. For example, although Amsterdam had limited activation rates at its current build-up, the market dynamics of its FTTH network have persuaded big market players to join the network operating company and finance the second deployment phase. Pau Broadband Country, in France is another example. When the French started their network in Pau take-up rates were very small, far lesser than initially anticipated. The management changed the form of operation: an ISP was introduced to offer internet services to the public, modern technologies were applied to reduce deployment costs and new services are currently being designed. These actions made the network more attractive to the citizens and increased substantially the penetration rates resulting in significant economic and social spillovers (e.g. IT related business activities are outsourced from Paris to the broadband-enabled Pau).

The article reflects on the decreasing deployment cost of FTTH and the contemporary research on spectrum management over copper and suggests that it may be wiser to take as much from the copper before replacing it with fiber. FTTH deployment, in the future, would cost less as the costs associated with FTTH construction are expected to decrease [1]. There is certainly another way to look at this. This strategy best fits incumbent access providers’ business plans that already own the copper and are local in nature (therefore making it easier to confront competition and secure their regional market share). That way Telcos can leverage on their existing infrastructure as much as possible, by applying incremental/marginal upgrades to their infrastructure. However, in the globalized economy, regional and national economies compete directly with one another and what is proven from international experience is that national and regional Governments cannot afford to let economic development in the hands of the traditional players of the market (i.e. incumbent telcos, cable operators). Municipal efforts to provide fiber access to their citizens is strongly underpinned by international developments and other communities being broadband enabled, thus becoming more competitive. Assessing the situation upon a narrow regional or even national perspective prevents decision makers to grasp the risks stemming from the lack of broadband .

By the same token, I have argued in a previous post (See: A Different View on Broadband Sustainability ), that municipal success should not necessarily be linked only with financial viability rather with the degree of accomplishment of its strategic objectives. Only if broadband infrastructure is laid to increase economic performances should its success be linked with financial profitability. Intuitively, if there existed clear indications that investments in the areas of interest where financially viable, telcos would probably have already invested and we wouldn’t be discussing in the first place. Municipalities invest in high-end communications infrastructures aiming at a much broader set of socio-economic results than financial profitability. These include among others a) opening the market to outsiders, 2) increase the level of competition, 3) increase broadband awareness, 4) improve health care and educational services etc.

I need to elaborate a little more on the article’s perspective on competition stimulation. I don’t see municipalities building broadband networks to directly compete with infrastructures already in place. If this was their ultimate objective then, as nicely put in the article, we would be seeing redundant electricity grids, water & sewage networks etc. On the contrary, the goal of the municipalities is to install broadband infrastructures that will enable any interested service provider to leverage on the municipal network and offer high-quality, value-adding broadband services to the citizens. Retail service offerings by municipalities are used to offset financial burden stemming from the lack of ISP’s interest to use the network. Municipal networks operating on open access principles ensures a fair and non-discriminatory provision of next generation access which can effectively spur competition. This is the unique added-value that municipal infrastructures offer to the broadband value chain and the public that no private ISP so far showed that is willing (or can “afford” to) provide to its competition (See: Infrastructure-based Competition in NGA: The Best Way Forward? )

The way I want to interpret the article is that we need to understand the reasons of failure/limited success of municipal broadband networks worldwide and learn from past experiences. Municipal initiatives need not to be discouraged by intermediate half-way through assessments rather be encouraged by the significant prospects of social and economic local development and enlighting international examples.

[1] I don’t see any dramatic change in the FTTH deployment costs in the near future. FTTH construction is labor intensive and construction totals approx. 70% of the full service cost (See: AIT Workshop on April 11, 2008 (comments and conclusions) – PART2 )

The news that Adamo, an FTTH operator of Swedish origin, present in Spain for the last few years is planning as of next week to provide high speed connections (100Mbps downloads) in the city of Barcelona has been all over Spanish fora.

Currently, the company offers 100Mbps connections in the principality of Asturias since 2007. Adamo has planned a country-wide expansion and will evaluate its businesses in Barcelona to adjust accordingly its expansion strategy.

The connections (100Mbps/20Mbps) are going to be priced at 29 euros, a little higher than what the rest of Europe is paying for ADSL2+ (24Mbps nominal speed). The service is going to be complemented by a 5-port router. Telefonica offers double play with internet connections at 6Mbps for 25,90/month.

In Switzerland, a small pilot project has been announced by EWB, the energy/water public utility of the city of Bern. The pilot will connect 50 households and 10 businesses with fiber. Unlike the example of EWZ (the energy/water utility counterpart in Zurich) “les Bernois” plan to feed 2 fibers per end-point and are considering policy measures to avoid infrastructure duplication.

The City council has already planned a meeting about the matter on March. City approval will certainly increase the odds for the project’s success.

Interestingly, the Socialist party has already asked for a city wide FTTH network. According to the Socialists, only public management can ensure non-discriminatory access to the citizens.

Via fibre-suisse.ch.

Just before the end of 2008 I arranged an interview with Marc Duchesne, an intriguing blogger and fiber enthousiast that has been involved in the municipal fiber network of the region of Pau, Pyrénées-Atlantiques in the south of France. I met with Marc on twitter and we have been chatting occasionally on fiber issues ever since. The reason for asking Marc for an interview is simple.

Allthough we experience globally an increasing trend of municipal involvement in next generation access (in various forms and shapes), smaller municipalities are faced with serious sustainability issues due to their limited clientele. For that particular reason, regional cooperation among neighbouring cities is getting steam, aiming at achieving operational economies of scale and attracting the interest of private ISPs. In this context, Marc gave me a great opportunity to find out more about Pau. I already knew some things about the project, however, very few details are available (in english) about it. And although my French are decent enough to spend vividly a day or two in France, it didn’t prove useful in this case. Marc was kind enough to answer all my questions and provide visibility to the Pau initiative.

Here’s the full interview. Enjoy!

Today i have with me Marc Duchesne, the man behind fibergeneration 3.0. Marc, please tell us a little about yourself and how you got involved in the fiber business?

I’m 48 years old and have 25 years of experience into fiber optics. I started my professional career in January 1983 with French railways, right at the beginning of fiber communications. I’m a pioneer of optical communications, with expertise in network design, cable design, hardware design, installation methods, testing processes, maintenance, etc. Basically speaking, I’m a fiber Installation & Maintenance guy.

How did you get yourself involved in the project at Pau?

That’s a good question! Actually, it’s thanks to the Web 2.0. Since a couple of years, I was blogging and commenting here and there about Broadband, Fiber, Internet and all that stuff. In late summer 2007, thanks to a blog post by the famous Jean-Michel Billaut, aka “The Father of The Minitel” and promoter of the Pau Broadband Country FTTH experiment, I went accidentaly in touch with Jean-Pierre Jambes, Head of Economic Development at the Pau Greater Area’s local government. After 30 minutes or so of conversation over Skype, Jean-Pierre Jambes offered me to work with him to develop new activities and businesses and services on the Pau Broadband Country (PBC) network.

Great! So in which ways are you invloved in the project?

PBC is live since 2005, but back in September 2007, there were only 5,000 active subscribers out of the 42,000 households passed. That was pretty much of an issue from the citizen perspective because most the people thought they’ve invested their own money into something that didn’t prove effective – which is not true anyway, provided the financial investment of the municipalities is completely covered by the redevance fees paid by Axione SPTHD. It was time for Jean-Pierre to show that PBC was the right stuff.

So other than the network infrastructure per se, meaning P2P, active Ethernet, etc. which has been proven reliable and viable (you may remember that back in 2002 nothing at all existed about FTTH design), there is still no new services on the fiber network, such as tele-medicine, tele-training, virtual world-based e-commerce, etc. As PBC has been envisaged as a real-world experimentation platform, it was time to go the next level and really look after those new services. My job is to look after the new stuff, bring new ideas, new concepts for new businesses and new projects.

Ok. So, when did Pau start thinking about developing an FTTH network?

In 2002, right after the Dotcom crash, the Telecoms industry was “dead”. Jean-Michel Billaut was running the forward-thinking think-tank of Paribas “l’Atelier” and was looking for a French city where he could implement his next big idea: FTTH, to create the life of the 21st century. The only mayor who understood and agreed on the scope of the idea was Mr Andre Labarrere, former Mayor of the city of Pau. Hence the Pau Broadband Country was established as a municipal initiative, all financed by “collectivity”, meaning the city of Pau itself plus the surrounding municipalities, the department, the region, etc.

What is the population of Pau, and how many cities are participating in the project?

Pau itself has approx. 80,000 inhabitants. With a total of 140,000 citizens, the 14 municipalities which are part of the Greater Area are covered by the FTTH network.

Have you deployed the backhaul network on your own or did you lease fiber from the incumbent?

Yes, the PBC FTTH network is a totally independent infrastructure, separated from those of the incumbent and its rivals. The PBC is a true Muni-network.

That’s interesting, may I ask why? Was it too expensive to lease backhaul circuits from the Telcos?

That’s a very good question. To be honest, I’ve started here with PBC last year, 5 yrs after the initiation of the project. I was not there when it all started. From my standpoint, we have visionaries here, Billaut, Jambes, Labarrere, a couple of others that realized that the future was certainly on the “Muni” networks, not on the Telcos networks. They realized that someday, the incumbent and its rivals would never be able to deploy FTTx outside of the biggest metropoles and these visionaries wanted to create a new model and test it.

Did you ask for any EU funding for the project?

The total budget represents approximately 18M€: the Pau Greater Area invested 7M€, totally financed by the relevance fees paid by the DSP owner (Axione, a subsidiary of Bouygues), the Aquitaine region put 1.1M€, and Europe brought 7.7M€ through FEDER funds.

So I see that the infrastructure is publicly owned. Which business model did you choose and implemented?

PBC runs on a 3-tiered business model:

1. Pau Greater Area “Communauté d’Agglomération Pau-Pyrenees” owns the network
2. Axione SPTHD Societe Paloise du Tres Haut Debit operates the network – design, engineering, installation, operation, and maintenance without provision of additional services
3. SFR-Cegetel, Heliantis, and other service provider are leasing the network to provide services.

Let me get back to the Telcos. Did the Telcos showed interest in offering services in the area? Were they easy to persuade? Were there agreements between the cities and the Telcos before the fiber deployment?

As of today, there is only one service provider for residential customers, and that is SFR. At the very beginning Pau has created the first IP operator, IPVset which was acquired by Cegetel which then became SFR. The rivals, e.g. Free, FT-Orange, Numericable are not offering services over PBC network. However, Numericable is currently upgrading its own HFC network here in Pau, outside the PBC infrastructure; which is a piece of evidence that Ultra-Broadband is making its way here.

What type of technology is presently used in PBC, what’s the coverage of the network, what type of services is SFR offering and what is the penetration of the fiber access? Do you price the services on a connection basis or on loop length basis?

The technology chosen back in 2003 for the Pau Broadband Country network is Active Ethernet. Active Ethernet allows symmetrical 10, 20, 100Mbps to Residential customers, up to 1Gbps to Enterprises. It is a pure P2P network, which is the only topology to date to guarantee the true Open Neutral Access.

As of today, more than 45,000 households are passed, with more than 9,000 active subscribers. The subscription rate is pretty interesting: 20 to 25 new connections per day. The only limitation for an even better penetration ratio: the lack of Outside Plant technicians. Not enough people to do the job! Amazing, when you think about the current discussions between ARCEP and the Telcos: whilst those are arguing on this or that technology, in Pau people are going to FTTH at the speed of light…

SFR is offering TriplePlay services: VoIP, high-speed Internet, and HD TV, at 34.90€/month. The pricing of those services are of the Telco responsibility, not of the Pau Greater Area.

How do you feel about Numericable competing with PBC?

This is not my role, as a consultant with the Pau Greater Area, owner of the PBC Pau Broadband Country network, to answer this type of question! However, from a pure personal point of view, I would say that Numericable is acting as it should do, in spite of the current competition against France Telecom and SFR. Whether they chose the right option, upgrading their existing network rather than moving to the PBC open infrastructure, that’s another question which I can’t answer!

Tell us about your future plans? How do you see the project developing in the future? Are the municipalities involved in PBC planning to offer advanced municipal services?

Since the FTTH “offering” is appealing to customers (see growth rate), it’s time to look forward. We are currently working on the creation of an open training and demo center for Broadband & Sustainable Development Technologies. The so-called CampusTHD3 will be formed of a network of different training centers, schools, and universities, which will offer training, education, and forward-thinking on FTTx, Green Tech, etc.

Our first goal is to educate technicians of the county for the Telcos, the contractors, the integrators etc. For instance, the key players such as Axione and Alcatel-Lucent need to train new resources. CampusTHD3, together with its partners such as the Novea Association will create skilled technicians and network design engineers in the area.

We are also planning creating new tools for education and training, eg we are looking to Cisco Telepresence, web-based education tools, etc.

Our second objective is to create a brand new ecosystem. This will involve advanced city network management, water, gas, electricity, ie all public utilities networks. We are looking for ways to build sustainable models to manage energy consumption by leveraging on the FTTx network.

Last but not least, we are working on a couple of initiatives aimed at keeping elders and disabled persons at home – rather than sending them to nursing homes or specialized clinics. This type of application is perhaps the most important one on Fiber Broadband. Everybody is looking after the “killer app” which would justify the switch to FTTH everywhere. Maybe Social sensitivity is this one…

Have you already seen the FTTH network affecting the economic development of the Pau area?

We are starting to feel the economic impact of the FTTH network. Many corporations are relocating facilities in Pau, e.g. Total and Turbomeca (aerospace defense) have built their R&D centers in the area. Also, many corporations are relocating their data centers in Pau. You may think of Pau as being the hard drive of Paris!

That’s very interesting. In your blog, I read about plans for a Fiber Camp next year. Tell me a little bit about this project. How do you see it shaping?

In my humble opinion the FTTH deployments by Munis can’t happen quickly if we keep using 20-yrs old processes, which we are using today. So it’s time to think out of the box, from a blank piece of paper. How to deploy FTTH faster, easier, and cheaper!

Everyone interested in changing the (fiber) World is invited. It is going to be open, free, with the only requirement that everybody must contribute to the process.

One last thing, are there similar initiatives active in France?

There was Gonfreville L’Orcher, near Le Havre, where all the Oil & Gas companies keep their refineries. It is a municipal network with a plan to have 3,000 active subscribers by Dec 2008. As of today, only a few hundreds are lit up. The contractors must fix some technical issues before completion.

That proves the need for BIG CHANGE in minds, hence the FiberCamp plan. And also, due to French telcos FT, Free, SFR, Numericable having shifted their FTTH plans for 2010, which gives us 2 more years to get some technicians ready and plan ahead.

Thank you very much Marc. It was very nice to have you today with me for this insightful interview. I wish you the best of luck with your endeavors and I promise I will be watching closely the developments in Pau. Please keep us posted!

Thank you too. I will!

Earlier this year the cabinet (the minister and the secretary general) of the Ministry of Communications has been replaced, due to a major Government cabinet shuffle. At that time, the fears that this change will affect the pace of the ambitious FTTH project for the 52 largest cities of Greece does not seem to materialize though. A committee comprised of senior executives from the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Development and the Ministry of Communications assembled last week to re-assess the time-schedule and actions.

The goal of the new leadership of the ministry remains to initiate the tender by the second half of 2009 as it was initially planned. It has been announced that actions to secure the necessary approvals for the required public-private partnerships to move forward with the project are being taken.

Responding to a question about the project, Panagis Vourloumis, OTE’s CEO declared the organization’s aim to play the major role in this project commenting that current plans for VDSL access (note: OTE has already VDSL pilots in place) will complement the FTTH network, in areas where fiber will not be made available yet.

According to current project requirements, OTE and other potentially interested telcos can only participate in the bid by forming a separate company as it is not allowed for firms active in the telecommunications service business to take part in the project.

On a different front, this Friday the Memorandum of Cooperation for the “Broadband Network of Southwest Greece” will be signed by the participating cities of the area. Read this to recall the details. What’s more important is that the Hellenic Central Union of Municipalities and Communitites fully supports these regional initiatives and has played an important part in these developments.

So, there you have it, on one hand, the central government’s plan and on the other, a series of ambitious local authorities driven initiatives, both aiming to bring fiber reality closer to the public. Which is going to last, which is going to perish? Under which circumstances may they co-exist – or merge? (add this to my posts-to-do list).