Virgin FTTC

Have Virgin considered using FTTC to extend their coverage. Bundling TV & HS Broadband & Telephone at the righ price could be attractive and would enable Virgin to grow their market share. Currently the only way to grow their revenues is to up sell to existing customers

Virgin are expanding their HFC network to some extent, in part by infilling.

They have also done a trial FTTH using electricity poles to carry the fibre and participated in a trial of rural FTTC in cooperation with Vtesse.

Virgins trial with poles to bring FTTH in Wolverhampton was announced in the news then disapeared with nothing more said about the progress/completion of the trial.

they did one in Wales that was delivered. http://www.v3.co.uk/v3/news/2267107/virgin-start-ele...

It mentions Woolhampton as another trial location - confusion of geography ?

They tend to do a lot of talk & one of trials but little actualy happens. They hve talked of in filling but there is no evidence that it is hapening

They hve talked of in filling but there is no evidence that it is hapening

Is there evidence that it is not ?

McNicks are recruiting jointers, cablers, installers and managers at the moment for their Virgin contract so something is up.

Edited by deleted (Sat 29-Jan-11 20:01:08)

Yes the lack of any areas being infilled. The only very tiny amounts of infiling is where builders are subsidising it on new estates in the Virgin Cable areas but very few builders are doing this. THere is certainly no general infiling going on

Yes the lack of any areas being infilled.

Evidence ?

http://pressoffice.virginmedia.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=2...

says "As well as investing in the expansion of its network through traditional underground cable building work"

are they lying ? can you prove it ? have you checked every corner of every Virgin Media area ?

You should take your evidence to the SEC and others, as regulatory financial statements by Virgin include things like "Strong growth was also driven by the expansion of our unique fibre optic network as during the quarter, we passed 72,000 further homes."

it would be a criminal offence to mislead the market with statements like that if untrue.

Edited by yarwell (Sat 29-Jan-11 22:17:58)

They have got to catch us yet .... and FTTC is rolling faster every week.... yipee..( south mids )

Well, I haven't applied for a position at McNicks. Indeed I am thankfully no longer involved in fibre build in any form at all and have no wish to go back there.

In my opinion the reason Openreach FTTC will outperform Virgin is not only due to cherry picking, it's because Openreach network is open.

Virgin is working a monopoly with no choice of provider for punters and showing anti competitive behaviour with duct sharing. They just ain't got it.

The residential market is no longer BT v Virgin, it's BT, TalkTalk, Sky, o2 etc v Virgin.

How the tables have turned.

Edited by deleted (Sat 29-Jan-11 23:43:58)

In reply to a post by yarwell:

they did one in Wales that was delivered. http://www.v3.co.uk/v3/news/2267107/virgin-start-ele...

It mentions Woolhampton as another trial location - confusion of geography ?

Woolhampton is a village in West Berkshire near to the train line

Local news article, appared once or twice in the local news then vanished.

http://www.newburytoday.co.uk/News/Article.aspx?arti...

Woolhampton is very close to my village, i believe the works are to the north of the A4 as ive not seen anything myself of Virgins works.

Cat and mouse, with regards to overheads ofcom want to de reg BT more however they will of course charge for the use, and the power industry will need law changes for cable to be attatched to power lines.

The power planners in the midlands have been asked by tier 1 if any of us want to work on a project for virgin media in their exchanges, so that too could mean something.

Joint User Poles (JUP's) exist now between BT and DNO's but only at LV and are a royal pain in the backside for both parties.
Stringing stuff on HV will be a complete nightmare even if it is outside the danger zone. It's bad enough with our own cat's for faults and repairs. Wonder who pays for the repairs when the pikeys cut the poles down.....

In reply to a post by Rockh:

Joint User Poles (JUP's) exist now between BT and DNO's but only at LV and are a royal pain in the backside for both parties.
Stringing stuff on HV will be a complete nightmare even if it is outside the danger zone. It's bad enough with our own cat's for faults and repairs. Wonder who pays for the repairs when the pikeys cut the poles down.....

There is no problem stringing fibre on HV lines it is already done. They can hot work on the lines as well if need be meaning no interuption to the power

I have followed this up. The trial has not gone ahead and no further information is available

They can hot work on the lines as well if need be meaning no interuption to the power

At what voltage is this impractical ? 3.3 / 11 / 132 kV ?

The trial has not gone ahead and no further information is available

which of the two ?

Hot Glove can be done at any voltage upto 440kV. The linesmen at work who do this, do have a few screws loose and some impressive kit.

It's been done in various methods on EHV power lines aka Energis. Depends on the method that has been proposed, however cat working is a royal pain.

In reply to a post by Rockh:

Hot Glove can be done at any voltage upto 440kV. The linesmen at work who do this, do have a few screws loose and some impressive kit.

So the high voltage sometimes blows their pants off?

Virgin have indeed been busy infilling areas.

I know Leicester has been infilled, a poster on here Crysalis I think he's called finally got VM 20Mb and it was massively over subscribed.

I live in a cable franchise area and the developer would not come to an agreement with Telewest so we didn't get cable. I enquired about getting it installed and they said it would cost around £350 per home to run cable in the street. Their current budget is £250 so they said at the moment it is not going to happen.

There are streets around here with the green virgin cabs and conduit to all the homes but the cabs are empty and there is no coax under the pavement. I'm sure these will be done first before any of our homes.

Could you have cable only ISP's that use the Virgin network yet don't have anything to do with VM?

Could you have cable only ISP's that use the Virgin network yet don't have anything to do with VM?

your question is a bit of a contradiction as obviously they would need a wholesale agreement with VM. AOL used to do "AOL over cable" in the UK, may still exist as a legacy product.

No reason at all why it couldn't be wholesaled but it depends what you're trying to bypass. If the connection from the cabinet or the local coax is overloaded that would affect any ISP using it, surely ?

I still think have a reall independent local loop is the way forward. It makes no sense now that TV & data have converged to have two seperate networks.

I would bring both the BT local loop & the Virgin Local loop & TV network under a single independent company. Its business would just be to provided and maintain the local loop. It would provide no end user services.

Whilst the local loop is tied to BT or Virgin it will never be truely open and the regulator will be constantly having to step in. At present BT will do its best within the legislation to keep the competition out

Other ISP's & Teleco's will always be at a disadvantge when the critical part of the infrustructure is owned & controlled by their biggest comptitor

In reply to a post by Bob_s2:

Other ISP's & Teleco's will always be at a disadvantge when the critical part of the infrustructure is owned & controlled by their biggest comptitor

However all independent companies in all lines of business jump far more for their biggest one or two customers than they do for the rest. Far more than is currently allowed to BT Openreach and BT Wholesale by OfCom, weak-kneed though it is.

Thought: Singe telecoms/TV loop - how do you merge the disparate technologies without spending billions?
Also do you outlaw other local loops, thus forcing all community broadband to close or hand over to the new incumbent.

One big single loop sounds very philantropic, but those running it will be the same small faces, and thus the same sort of things will end up happening. It may actually stifle innovation

I would bring both the BT local loop & the Virgin Local loop & TV network under a single independent company.

that'll cost a Bob or two.

One big single loop sounds very philantropic

it sounds like communism to me. That's widely regarded as a good idea too, not.

Or a commercial company that can now create its own monopoly and serve its largest customer best, ignoring requests from the smaller providers.

e.g. big provider XY wants to see unlimited cheap as chips and wants traffic management down at local node level (so they can buy less backhaul), and traffic management becomes the norm. with unmanaged costing around £2 per GB.

The current situation is not Ideal, but its very hard in reality to create an ideal situation.

In reply to a post by yarwell:

One big single loop sounds very philantropic

it sounds like communism to me. That's widely regarded as a good idea too, not.

Not at all. It makes no sense economically to have in effect two lor more local loops. It would be no different to Power. We only have a single company providing the National Grid. They do not serve end users. The end users are served by the distribution companies. You can buy your electricity from any of the distribtion companies and they can all compete on pretty level playing field

It would be no different to Power.

however it is fundamentally different to power because electricity is exactly the same for everyone and if my retail supplier goes bust the electric (ditto gas) keeps coming through the meter. Data transit and services aren't the same. If my ISP goes titsup.com or I don't pay my bills it stops working.

You don't buy electricity from distribution companies, you buy it from retailers. My distribution company happens to be part of a power generator that also has a retail arm.

The National Grid provides the backbone very much like we have several fibre and microwave backbones for data - are you proposing to merge all those as well ?

I'm quite happy to have three local loops (telephone, cable TV and FTTH) which each has different capabilities and competition works in Virgin areas.

In reply to a post by yarwell:

It would be no different to Power.

however it is fundamentally different to power because electricity is exactly the same for everyone and if my retail supplier goes bust the electric (ditto gas) keeps coming through the meter. Data transit and services aren't the same. If my ISP goes titsup.com or I don't pay my bills it stops working.

You don't buy electricity from distribution companies, you buy it from retailers. My distribution company happens to be part of a power generator that also has a retail arm.

The National Grid provides the backbone very much like we have several fibre and microwave backbones for data - are you proposing to merge all those as well ?

I'm quite happy to have three local loops (telephone, cable TV and FTTH) which each has different capabilities and competition works in Virgin areas.

THe competition though does not work. In general BT will for instance avoid rolling out new technology to cable areas as it knows its potential market is smaller

If your retail electric supplier went bust potentially you would loose your electricity supply so even you anaolgy does not hold up

An independent local loop would be less of a monopoly then we have now where BT own it

The local Loop could be publicaly owned but put out to tender to a private company to operte and maintain to ensure value for money. You also dont get the conflict of interest that we have with BT owning it

In reply to a post by Bob_s2:

The local Loop could be publicaly owned but put out to tender to a private company to operte and maintain to ensure value for money. You also dont get the conflict of interest that we have with BT owning it

Errrr?

Please could you tell us how long the franchise would be, and what incentive such a company would be given to encourage them to invest billions of pounds in any more advanced or comprehensive network than we have now. Bearing in mind that in order to make a profit the prices charged to the distribution companies would inevitably reflect considerably less than the time-span of the franchise.

to ensure value for money

Define "value for money" in this context. Two extremes for example being 98% 2Mbps coverage with 10GB allowances and 90% 100Mbps coverage with truly unlimited allowances, and whatever the costs of each may be.

Or would that be determined by a regulator of some sort, which would also be responsible for the recurring tender invitations and franchise awarding.

You are continually putting out wild and woolly bright ideas about utopian data comms facilities. No meat. No practicality or business feasibility assessments.

yeah and the reason for the oversubscription is obvious.

Lets look at VM vs <insert adsl provider> in my area.

VM start of 2010 launch 10,20,50mbit cable in my area which previously was adsl broadband only. ADSL can get 0-6mbit depending on luck of where you located, yes some lines here dont sync due to line length/quality. VM sync's at full rate regardless.
8 week backlog for installs and within 2 months of launch is fully subbed on capacity and oversubscribed.
VM have done some reseg's and work on improving performance, their docsis3 network now is adequate in this area but still lightly congested, however generally beats BT services down hard. Their docsis1 network on paper Beats BT services but the congestion on that makes it not fit for purpose.
Now today, I am on a 30mbit VM cable service that has some light congestion but is still giving me 28-29mbit throughput on a sunday evening. The upstream congestion has improved enough that I can use things like ssh most of the time but still bursts of silly lag.
My adsl line with xilo now (ukonline RIP) drops once or twice a week and is currently synced at 5.5mbit. 1/6th of the speed I have on VM and I am not even on VM's top tier for my area, scary.
My VM gives me 1.05 up on speedtest.net, the adsl line 0.68 up.

So as far as my area is concerned VM have it sown up. The exception probably been in if a gamer adsl will probably be preferable. Incidently VM have upload speed uplift's due here in august 2011 and 100mbit services due sept 2011, BT say the area isnt viable for FTTC not just my immediate area but the entire city and suburbs.

So for some of us, its BT not doing the investing,

Edited by Chrysalis (Sun 06-Feb-11 20:07:03)

THe competition though does not work. In general BT will for instance avoid rolling out new technology to cable areas as it knows its potential market is smaller

You're clearly wrong there, because BT is indeed doing FTTC in Cable areas precisely because competition does work and they don't want to lose customers to faster cable services.

If your retail electric supplier went bust potentially you would loose your electricity supply so even you anaolgy does not hold up

you demonstrably have no understanding. My retail electricity supplier did go bust, as it happens. The regulator transfers you to a default supplier if you don't take action. To loose my supply would mean someone coming round and pulling the fuse out of my incomer - I hope they send a big bloke if they want to try that.

The whole point is that electricity (an analogy you introduced, by the way) is different to comms in that it is absolutely the same to all consumers and it isn't a point to point service.

an update, seems one suburb is deemed viable by BT now, so one tiny part of the city. Maybe BT will break the 10mbit barrier here by 2020.

In reply to a post by Chrysalis:

an update, seems one suburb is deemed viable by BT now, so one tiny part of the city. Maybe BT will break the 10mbit barrier here by 2020.

BT in effect have a monopoly. They have no great incentive to roll out FTTC other then at a pedestrian pace

Would BT rollout a lot faster if they faced competition? The answer is clearly yes

BT's approach will be why spend Bilions in upgrading the network when it faces no real loss of revenue if it does not

In reply to a post by Bob_s2:

Would BT rollout a lot faster if they faced competition? The answer is clearly yes

BT's approach will be why spend Bilions in upgrading the network when it faces no real loss of revenue if it does not

Who else is going to spend even more billions with no comparable existing infrastructure to link to and no established customer base, including other ISPs and their customers as well as BT Retail customers in that count?

In reply to a post by Bob_s2:

In reply to a post by Chrysalis:

an update, seems one suburb is deemed viable by BT now, so one tiny part of the city. Maybe BT will break the 10mbit barrier here by 2020.

BT in effect have a monopoly. They have no great incentive to roll out FTTC other then at a pedestrian pace

Would BT rollout a lot faster if they faced competition? The answer is clearly yes

BT's approach will be why spend Bilions in upgrading the network when it faces no real loss of revenue if it does not

BT does not have a monopoly in Fibre networks at current, hence why it is rolling out FTTC/FTTH as fast as it can, without providing more investment to fund it.

Where will this competion come from, you fail to mention this.

BT has been upgrading its network continuously, you always invest back into you're product over time to reduce costs and increase revenue.

LOL bt investing in it's seriously outdated copper pair infrastructure, that is susceptible to crosstalk from neighbouring lines, it makes me laugh that they are only now starting to put fiber in and even where they do put it in,the failing copper to the home will still cause issues for those who currently have them,
Bt has made immense profits out of nothing for the past decade, the copper pair was designed for voice only and still is, in my local area also bt are only rolling out fttc in a small part of it, that being the most affluent part of it, when the price bt charge for line rental ect is the same regardless of where you live,
As for VM cable this is only available within a small area too,pointless and hopeless, until some one else gets in on the act ,which i have a feeling ain't gonna happen anytime soon

Well unless you are wanting the goverment to pay for a full FFTH network roleout then you can forget it happening soon.
BT has been upgrading its core network over the last few years before there fibre rollout began without that happening you would not be able to support a FFTC network that has to be economically viable to rolleout and any large investment takes years to make a return.

If the money is not there it wont happen and OFCOM is proably the biggest obsticale in the way of rolling out any future network.

BT are light years behind most of the rest of the world. The BT network has suffered from a serious underinvestment for very many years.

The very imited FTTC rollout is already way behind schedule It has also suffered from poor and limited marketing again due to the conflict of interests within BT

A better way forward short of floating the local loop off would be for OFCOM to require a clear split between the local loop. BT wholesale & BT retail. This could be achieved by creating a wholly owned BT subsidery company say called BT Openreach. This would be only reponsible for the local loop. It would not provide end users services or maintain customer premises

This gives a more level playing field and removes the current conflict of interests

BT are light years behind most of the rest of the world.

what utter tosh. You are Bob22 and I claim my £5.

My spidey sense has been saying that since I read his first few posts

In reply to a post by Rockh:

My spidey sense has been saying that since I read his first few posts

Was it the name that gave it away? I thought that was a big clue.

The apparent density was at least as big a clue. I'm just waiting for powerline broadband to surface as the next great thing.

In reply to a post by Anonymous:

LOL bt investing in it's seriously outdated copper pair infrastructure, that is susceptible to crosstalk from neighbouring lines, it makes me laugh that they are only now starting to put fiber in and even where they do put it in,the failing copper to the home will still cause issues for those who currently have them,
Bt has made immense profits out of nothing for the past decade, the copper pair was designed for voice only and still is, in my local area also bt are only rolling out fttc in a small part of it, that being the most affluent part of it, when the price bt charge for line rental ect is the same regardless of where you live,
As for VM cable this is only available within a small area too,pointless and hopeless, until some one else gets in on the act ,which i have a feeling ain't gonna happen anytime soon

In my area we are not lucky enough to have even copper into our houses. Aluminium, sigh.

In reply to a post by yarwell:

BT are light years behind most of the rest of the world.

what utter tosh. You are Bob22 and I claim my £5.

Britain has one of the lowest average broadband speeds in the whole of europe, so he has a point.....

In reply to a post by dave2150:

Britain has one of the lowest average broadband speeds in the whole of europe,

I'd be interested to see some figures to back that up... Ofcom couldn't manage it. On headline speeds we're fairly typical, with the lowest proportion of really slow lines- see Ofcom report, pp310-311.

In reply to a post by dave2150:

In reply to a post by yarwell:

BT are light years behind most of the rest of the world.

what utter tosh. You are Bob22 and I claim my £5.

Britain has one of the lowest average broadband speeds in the whole of europe, so he has a point.....

The only thing we're exceptionally low on is speeds in high density urban areas.

Between Virgin's 100Mb cable product and BT's pretty weak attempt at NGA progress will be made, nonetheless the main obstacles are the expense of network construction and the potential lack of return on investment.

Ofcom ensured we have some of the lowest prices and have rigged our market so that it's a drive to the lowest common denominator, we're very price sensitive and few have much interest in paying the kind of sums required to recoup investment in new fibre infrastructure with the existing regulations, taxation and planning.

There was some Akamai report I think which showed us lower down, but that is actual throughput, and thus is because it seems the majority vote with their wallet and buy the cheapest packages that are available and give impression of broadband speeds.

If we look at what is available with some 45-50% of homes having VM 50Meg, FTTC'age passed climbing and 100Meg from VM (and others), then the availability is there, just we enjoy moaning that we don't have it.

There may be less moaning about coverage in France, due to the prevelance of rental properties, i.e. cheaper to move to an area with coverage if it is important.

I think there's also a fair indication (not sure I'd call it evidence) from both this bbs and the tbb broadband maps that a bit of attention to internal wiring could pay large dividends on many lines.

Arguably BT can take some of the blame for that by not providing good advice, but by no means all of it!

In reply to a post by billford:

I think there's also a fair indication (not sure I'd call it evidence) from both this bbs and the tbb broadband maps that a bit of attention to internal wiring could pay large dividends on many lines.

Arguably BT can take some of the blame for that by not providing good advice, but by no means all of it!

And for trying to charge £90 (was it?) to visit and fit an iPlate?

Do they still offer that service?

There may be less moaning about coverage in France

>shrug<

French FTTH takeup is very low - below 10%.

And for trying to charge £90 (was it?) to visit and fit an iPlate?

sounds like a main dealer labour chargeout rate, and you have to take the car to them.

And for trying to charge £90 (was it?) to visit and fit an iPlate?

I think that is the Home IT visit which may include fitting an iPlate

I prefer to deal in facts rather than BT;s PR spin. If you look at a report out today we are off the radar as far as FTTC is concerned, we are prety much a non starter
The front runners are:-

Lithuiania
Sweden
Norway
Slovinia
Slovakia
Russia
Denmark
Latvia
Estonia
Bulgeria
Portugal

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

In reply to a post by Rockh:

My spidey sense has been saying that since I read his first few posts

Was it the name that gave it away? I thought that was a big clue.

I like to give people the benefit of the doubt

In reply to a post by yarwell:

The apparent density was at least as big a clue. I'm just waiting for powerline broadband to surface as the next great thing.

God no...

A link to the report would be good and common courtesy.

In reply to a post by Bob_s2:

I prefer to deal in facts rather than BT;s PR spin. If you look at a report out today we are off the radar as far as FTTC is concerned, we are prety much a non starter

I presume you mean this one:

http://www.thinkbroadband.com/news/i/4570.html

It's for FTTH, not FTTC. Do keep up

Edited by billford (Wed 09-Feb-11 18:03:45)

facts - like "light years behind" ? LOL. A few years at most. Get a sense of perspective.