The steep cost of rolling out high-speed broadband infrastructure in...

80 percent of the cost of providing infrastructure, and the European Commission has identified three potential areas for cost reduction: sharing existing networks, co-deployment of new infrastructure, and planning for infrastructure in new developments. Under those broad areas, the study assessed the potential impact of: (1) A centralized atlas of passive infrastructure. (2) Mandatory access to passive infrastructure. (3) A one-stop shop on rights-of-way and administrative procedures. (4) A database where all planned civil works must be listed. (5) A requirement to equip new buildings with 100 Mbps Internet, together with mandated open access to the terminating segment. A centralized atlas could be anything from a database with information on which network operators are active and where, to a map showing the exact routes of infrastructure, and details of ownership and capacity for network-sharing, the study said. It could enable broadband development using shared ducts, with potential cost savings coming from a reduction in the initial investment required for deployment, it said. That could also cut down on damage to existing infrastructure work, it said. Mandated access to passive infrastructure is already in place in many EU countries where incumbents must offer access to ducts or are subject to a further universal-access obligation, the report said. The initial cost to state or national regulators is low, and the ongoing price of maintaining the measure depends on what rules are needed and the number of disputes to be resolved, it said. The one-stop shop is rare in Europe, but some governments have simplified rights-of-way and administrative procedures, it said. Again, the cost to the nation of implementing such a system is considered low, with ongoing expenses depending on the number of disputes, it said. Putting a one-stop shop in place is likely to require a centralized database and, therefore, some information technology (IT) investment, but could spur self-deployment of broadband networks, it said. If handled well, this measure could reduce the administrative burden on operators during the planning phase of network development and lead to greater coverage, it said. The point of a database where all planned civil works are published is to lower deployment costs by sharing excavation costs between operators and utility companies, it said. But such a system poses challenges for operators, and there are examples where coordinating civil works costs them more than deploying networks alone, it said. The requirement that all new buildings have 100 Mbps Internet and mandated open access to the terminating segment is already in place in Spain and France for all new and refurbished buildings, Analysys Mason said. The regulatory cost is low but estimates of the expense of installing the wiring in a building during construction vary widely, it said. Cost savings of pre-wiring a building during construction are thought to be up to 60 percent, it said. Mandated access to passive infrastructure “is the measure that performs most strongly in a cost-benefit analysis” although experience has shown that it’s mainly the ducts owned by incumbent telecom operators that are most used in next-generation access (NGA) deployment, and that EU-level regulation is already in place to enable that. Coordinating civil works could also offer significant benefits because of the low implementation cost, it said. Requiring in-building wiring won’t cost regulators much but could take some time for the benefits to materialize, it said. A one-stop shop for rights-of-way and administrative procedures is mostly a time-saving device, but it could enable faster NGA deployments, bringing operators revenue sooner, it said. A centralized atlas of passive infrastructure would enable mandated access to passive infrastructure but putting such a measure in place could be extremely pricey, it said. All five measures are interlinked, particularly the centralized atlas, one-stop shop and database of planned civil works, the report said. If done in parallel, it’s likely that a lot of the IT costs would overlap, and the resulting system would allow implementation of mandated access to passive infrastructure, encouraging deployment in shared ducts and self-deployment, it said.