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'Mixed economy' broadband opportunity

 

The dawn of a new 'mixed economy' for broadband services in the UK finds BT Wholesale ideally placed to take commercial advantage.

So says BT Wholesale's director of broadband Sian Baldwin who confirms that communications providers' (CPs) customers are increasingly demanding a wide range of services to suit different lifestyles.

"It's no longer a case of one size fits all," she says. "Businesses and households will increasingly be able to choose the broadband service that suits their needs best - whether delivered over copper, fibre or mobile networks.

"And it's not always about speed. It's also about lifestyle choices," added Sian. "We're in a good position because our single, rich broadband portfolio will enable CPs to offer their customers a mix of services to suit all tastes and pockets."

Some important milestones have been passed as BT Wholesale lays the foundations for its flexible approach to broadband.

Already BT's next generation broadband copper-based services on BT's 21st Century Network (21CN) are available from exchanges serving 40 per cent of the UK, that's an infrastructure big enough to serve ten million homes and businesses. And rollout continues with the next target being to reach 55 per cent of UK homes and businesses by spring 2010.

HD ready

Sian says such copper-based provision makes it possible for CPs to offer their customers speeds of up to 24 Mb/s supporting High Definition TV and other popular high-bandwidth services. Today BT Wholesale offers a Wholesale Broadband Connect component-based service plus an end-to-end managed option.

But many CPs also want to offer even higher speeds and this is being catered for with BT Wholesale's access fibre broadband services.

The much-publicised fibre-to-the-premise broadband trial at Ebbsfleet, Kent is delivering speeds of up to 100Mb/s, and BT plans to roll-out fibre to as many as ten million homes by 2012.

With download speeds of up to 40 Mb/s – and potentially 60Mb/s – and upstream rates of up to 10Mb/s, fibre-to-the-cabinet broadband will be appealing to homeworkers, gamers and will comfortably satisfy the predicted demand for simultaneous entertainment services.

Customer pilots are underway in Cardiff and Muswell Hill, London. BT is on track to bring fibre services within reach of a million UK homes and businesses by March 2010, rising to 1.5 million by early summer and ten million by 2012.

But there are also less visible but equally significant infrastructure deployments enriching BT Wholesale's broadband portfolio, such as the 600 21CN Ethernet nodes introduced across the country earlier this year. Today BT has the widest national footprint of high-speed Ethernet in the UK and plans to keep that position by increasing the nodes to more than 820 this year.

Sian explains that, while Ethernet primarily supports communications within individual organisations, it offers hidden benefits to the broadband 'mixed economy' too.

"Ethernet is integral to the delivery of broadband because it links mobile base stations and provides the backhaul for next generation services," she says.

"People with a mobile may choose broadband with a maximum download speed of around 7 Mb/s because of the 'anywhere' attractiveness."

Mobile broadband

To meet the projected growth in mobile broadband traffic, BT Wholesale is providing high-speed Ethernet next generation connections to four of the UK's leading mobile network providers and additional product offerings are in the pipeline.

Sian says BT Wholesale is also helping to ensure CPs deliver the very best broadband customer experience.

"We use a dynamic line management to offer the most stable broadband lines. CPs can select stability options to tailor the broadband service to reflect the type and cost of the package they want to offer their customers."

And on the horizon are new value added services. Software-driven web 2.0 applications will enable CPs to offer innovative applications and services. While the unique power of broadband is being harnessed to deliver a fantastic content experience for end users.

"The growth of the 'mixed economy' marks the beginning of a new chapter in the UK's broadband story. BT Wholesale's rich and flexible broadband portfolio is ideally placed to help CPs plan and execute their broadband strategies with confidence. It's underpinning more and more customer choice and opening the door to exciting and innovative applications."