NextGen 12 conference in Westminster

Conference Report by John Colton:

The two days of talks and debate about future broadband kicked-off with a typically lively presentation by Peter Cochrane, ex-CTO of BT, which highlighted the way the world is changing due to technology and how we will have to think and work in different ways. Information and the communication of information will be key to this and our future success as a country. Peter pointed out that objectors suggest that there is no proven demand for future services, but this is always the case with anything new. For this new vision we need fast broadband, 1 Gb/s both upstream and down, hence symmetrical. Peter also pointed out that nothing else provides what optical fibre can do, and that if we don’t stop talking and get on and build the [FTTP] networks “then frustration will rapidly migrate to full economic disadvantage and disablement”.

By contrast, later in the day Liv Garfield, CEO Openreach (BT’s access network arm), suggested that in their labs they had not been able to replicate a situation where a typical family could not do everything they needed to do with just 24 Mb/s. Additionally she felt the demand was all downstream with upstream being significantly less important. Liv did however qualify this by acknowledging that future needs would almost certainly require higher speeds and so we should absolutely plan to install for higher speeds. There was also an acknowledgement from Liv that BT’s main rollout of FTTC technology will not work well in rural areas, not something an admission I’d ever heard from BT before.

These views are in some ways poles apart, and they are in some ways matched by the views of delegates at the event with all acknowledging that we will all need FTTP, but some feeling that FTTC is a step on the journey whilst others feel the slower FTTC shows a lack of ambition and invariably delays the inevitable FTTP. The economics and cost arguments are paramount, but seem to take little account of the future.

To just pick out here two talks is unfair to other presentations which were good and interesting, but to save time (for me and the reader) I will just list some soundbites:

• Digital inclusion is important and the digital divide is in some ways growing.
• Engaging with the digital world will be important to all people and professions with farmers and other traditionally non-digital technology industries highlighted. 
• The digital divide is in both infrastructure and user/population engagement. 
• Some feel the population engagement is key as it drives demand – they feel the infrastructure is getting the attention “there’s no point in building motorways if most people can’t drive cars”.
• There was no real disagreement - most felt we should do more to encourage those who have not engaged with computers or the digital world, but equally it holds true that people won’t learn to drive if there are no roads to drive on. 
• In Sweden they believe in ‘open networks’ which is quite different from ‘open access’ and effectively means that each company uses each others infrastructure and saves on duplication of build costs. This leads to reduced costs, increased competition and hence choice and lower prices for the customers. One Swedish service provider pointed out that although they sell direct to consumers 80% of their income is from their competitors renting dark fibre from them. 
• The Swedish delegates pointed out that they felt the economic argument was over- played in the UK. They said that in the future everything would be connected and the infrastructure was for society so just needed to be built. 
• In Sweden customers are now more concerned by broadband outages than power cuts! 
• Some interesting statistics on use of mobile devices.
• Now more than 81 million mobiles phones registered in the UK compared with less than 10 million in 1997 (15 years ago).
• 51% of mobile phones are now ‘smart phones’ with huge computing power.
• now more calls on mobile phones than land-lines.
• 90% of more mobile tablet PC use is in the home.
• telephone call traffic is reducing slightly.
• biggest growth is in data usage – predictions of huge increases in mobile date use in the next few years.
• 4G mobile masts will replace 3G, but by upgrade first 
•  new masts in rural areas are very difficult.
• low population density makes economics difficult:
• installed to ‘fill-in’ or maintain service coverage
• backhaul in rural areas is expensive to build
• electrical supply in rural areas also often has large civils cost

Lord Inglewood who is the chair of the House of Lords Communications Committee gave a presentation on the report they had produced on broadband in the UK and the government’s approach. This was well received, but with some criticism from some quarters. Fibre GarDen contributed evidence to the committee, and when I met Lord Inglewood at the event he was familiar with our project and appeared keen to take me up on an offer to visit us and see our group. Both Andrew and Stefan from fibre GarDen were names instantly suggested by Lord Inglewood and his clerk as being involved with our project, suggesting that our contributions were perhaps even more prominent than we had previously known.

Aside from the techy discussions on speeds and the economics questions, it is apparent that digital exclusion and the problems it will cause is a very hot topic now. In my view however the solutions so far put forward are constrained by the dire financial situation we are in and will therefore do little to address the issues. On speaker asked council representatives how they would help to get people online and engaged with the digital world – did they have a plan? To me this is another area where it is not councils who will take the lead, although they may have a role to play, it is the wider community with all of us helping and encouraging neighbours, but until we build the infrastructure in rural areas it will be hard to get our neighbours excited about something they can’t use at home!