Where would we be - FTTN and LLU

There would still be a national fibre network – in the form of Fibre to the Node, or cabinetisation, because the roll out is part of Telecom’s operational separation undertakings. There were some ISPs that were outraged when cabinetisation was announced, notably Orcon and Vodafone who claimed it would dampen their investment in Local Loop Unbundling.

Telecom Wholesale CEO Matt Crockett sights their reaction as one of three lowlights in his career at Telecom (see full interview in upcoming June TR). “When we confirmed our cabinet plans, our senior customers got taken by surprise, which surprised us because we’d shared a huge amount of information around where cabinets were going because we knew it would have an impact around their LLU investment.”

LLU investment has continued, with Vodafone and Orcon being joined by TelstraClear, Compass and CallPlus in providing unbundled services. It might seem as if it’s proceeding at a snail’s pace but according to the latest Commerce Commission audit, the growth in unbundled lines after 18 months appears to be better than international experience.

(Interestingly, Telecom’s rival in the UFB process Axia NetMedia, claims that the fibre Telecom has is about 5% of what is needed because 80% of the cost of deploying fibre is to the premise).