[CAnet - news] Palo Alto looks once again to deploy city wide FTTx

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[Palo Alto as some people may remember had an ambitious FTTx program that
was killed several years ago, but now seems to be a phoenix raising from the
ashes. The staff report prepared for city council is recommended reading for
any municipality thinking of a FTTx project. I am surprised that they are
only pushing for 100 Mbps, as these speeds will soon be available from the
cable companies with next generation of DOCSIS. FTTx deployments still lack
a strong business case in North America whether it is a telco or municipal
build.  The recent analysis below of Verison's FIOS project are a good
example of that. Their business case is predicated on earning revenues from
voice, data and video. But with VoIP and many video and TV producers quickly
moving to deliver their products over the Internet directly to the consumer
I fail to see how the telcos (or for matter the cablecos and/or municipal
FTTx) can make a living out of basic commodity high speed Internet.  In my
opinion a new and different business model and architecture is required
rather than current fossilized thinking of triple play or trying to extract
fees from the content providers. Deregulation or re-regulation such as
structural separation I don't see helping either. -- BSA]

Palo Alto Fiber
http://www.pafiber.net/

Palo Alto staff report
http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/cityagenda/publish/cmrs/documents/CMR398-05.pd
f



[This posting was from Drew Clark on Gordon Cook list -- BSA]

http://www.wiredinwashington.com/20061002.htm



snip


Neutrality rules scare Bell companies, and a quick look at last week's
financials from Verizon Communications reveals why. The New York-based Bell
has been the most aggressive in rolling out its super-fast fiber-optic
service, which it calls FiOS, past more than 3 million homes in nine states.

The company has spent more than $4 billion on FiOS, and plans to spend $18
billion by 2010. Currently, it costs the company $873 to string its wires
past the average home, and an additional $933 to send technicians and
physically connect wires to a home. Because only 15 percent subscribe to
FiOS, the average is $6,253 per customer.

By 2010, Verizon estimates that costs will drop to $700 per home, and $650
per connection. But even assuming Verizon's best-case scenario, in which 40
percent subscribe to its FiOS Internet or TV service, costs per customer
would average $2,400. At that rate, it would still take about two years to
recover costs from a customer who takes all three of services: voice, video
and broadband data.

Simply put, "Verizon is betting on getting money from someone else besides
the end-users," said University of Southern California economist Simon
Wilkie, the former chief economist at the FCC.

snip


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