Announced in September 2016, the project of a european Code of electronic communications for the purpose of redesign and evolve the “Telecom Package” of 2009. Whereas the Commission and the european Parliament are examining the proposed amendment, and that Estonia is chairing the Council since the 1 July, the FIRIP wish to return to certain points that are essential for the industrial sector that it represents.
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The FIRIP welcomes the aim of the “democratisation of the fibre to all” intended by the european commission. For those areas where infrastructure competition is not viable economically, the French example demonstrates that networks of public initiative (RIP) are an effective solution for the provision of services to very high speed (THD) over the entire territory.
The THD, as defined in the draft european Code of electronic communications, taking as a reference the performance of the optical fiber, while leaving the door open to the use of other technologies that would achieve the same quality of service. Several experiments, carried out since more than a year by members of the FIRIP and based on 4G technologies fixed (LTE fixed), have helped to validate the effectiveness in real conditions, with flow rates equal to or higher than 30 Mb/s. The 4G fixed is therefore an excellent alternative to access high speed broadband in the white areas on the deployment of the optical fiber would be a project too long-term.
The FIRIP welcomes the emergence of the concept of “area of digital exclusion”. It will be recalled that in France, the definition of these areas has enabled it to RIP FttH to develop with the necessary predictability to ultimately provide communities with solutions THD for their constituents. This process could be repeated for the benefit of other countries through the new european code, while taking advantage of the French experience.
The FIRIP welcomes the fact that the draft european Code provides for the stopping conditions of the local loop in copper history and wants to ensure that the access provider has established demonstrably the appropriate conditions for the migration, including through the provision of a product access to alternative comparable to achieve the same end-users that allowed for the use of the historic infrastructure. The FIRIP has recently been expressed in this sense in response to the public consultation by ARCEP on the areas fibrées, advocating for the rapid implementation of a complete status and really focused politically on a national scale.
In addition, and as soon as the internet became a common good and has changed behaviours on a global scale and, a fortiori, european, FIRIP encourages you to devote this a reality through the extension of Universal Service to broadband access. In order to anticipate on the needs of the longer term, it may be useful to include the THD in the Universal Service obligations and so ensure financial support for future deployments.
On the other hand, the FIRIP would like to get back on the relevance and the conditions of implementation of certain measures provided for in the draft european Code. The Commission wishes to apply regulation measures reduced for operators active only on the wholesale market. The FIRIP questions the definition that the Commission intends to use to define such actors, and on the regulatory measures that it intends to put in place. In particular, the draft Code should not work towards a reduction of the regulatory constraints imposed on operators holding a dominant influence because of a too broad definition, which would ultimately slow down the entry of smaller operators on the market and to strengthen the oligopolies.
The RIP, the assets exclusively on the wholesale market, promote competition and simplify regulation, in concordance with the objective of democratization of the fiber for all. In contrast to networks that are deployed to a private zone operators by vertically integrated, the RIP naturally have an interest in selling on the wholesale market. They propose, therefore, the conditions of access, non-discriminatory, transparent, attractive prices and following business processes, in essence compatible with the notion of equivalence of inputs. This is in strict accordance with the guidelines of the european Commission concerning State aid for the deployment of networks THD.
About the FIRIP :
Created on December 6, 2012 the Federation of Industrial Networks of Public Initiative (FIRIP), includes more than 180 companies, a turnover of 2 billion euros in 2016 in the RIP, representing 8.100 direct jobs in the various trades of the value chain of the RIP.
It demonstrates the economic importance of this new branch which wishes to participate actively in the Great project of the deployment of the THD estimated at more than € 20 billion by 2022, which is funded by the Public and the Private. The federation also wants to help in the promotion of the trades of the fibre deployment, and the qualification expertise necessary for the implementation of high speed broadband.
The FIRIP is the questioner Industrial Mission France very high speed, she is a member of the Strategic Committee of the Digital Sector, and showcases the tremendous impact of the deployment of the optical Fiber on the economy and on employment.
The Federation, develops constructive partnerships and non-exclusive with the set of institutional actors, the technical, the Regulator and the major economic players in the telecommunications sector, in order to contribute to the development of this sector. Cf. www.firip.fr
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