NEWS A group of telecoms operators have claimed that Britain's broadband market is being "stifled" because of BT's dominant position.
The Broadband Industry Group (BIG) urged the government to do more to encourage competition in the sector, in a statement published on Friday.
"The broadband market in the UK remains stifled by a lack of competition at the wholesale level where BT retains a monopolistic 99 per cent share in DSL, the leading technology," said BIG, which is made up of Brightview, Cable & Wireless, Centrica, Energis, Freeserve and Tiscali.
"Unless a genuinely competitive market is created, alternative broadband providers, consumers, businesses and the UK economy as a whole will miss out on the benefits of broadband."
BIG was responding to comments made by e-commerce minister Stephen Timms earlier this week, when he told the Financial Times that tougher targets might be needed to encourage businesses to take up high-speed internet services.
Timms's comments showed that the government is beginning to plan its strategy for the next five or six years.
According to BIG, a key part of that process will be increased competition, with BT losing some market share to other telecoms operators - such as BIG's members.
BT, though, rejects BIG's claim that Broadband Britain is being stifled by a lack of competition.
"It seems incredible that they have ignored the fact there are more than one and a half million cable subscribers," said a BT spokesman, adding that there are "literally dozens" of ISPs reselling its own ADSL services.
"The UK really is one of the most, if not the most, competitive broadband markets in the world."
Graeme Wearden writes for ZDNet UK
Comments
There are 14 comments. Join the discussion
1. Brian Thornton
Its time to stop blaming BT for the UK governments lack of investment. A continuence of tax relief on IT investment with a proviso that such investment included BBand connectivity would have been a useful driver.
2. Tim Jarrett
Personally, I think broadband takeup is being stiffled by the extremely high monthly charges being levied to the consumers. How many people can justify paying £17.99 - £49.99 every month, for a service that they may only use once or twice in that month ?
If the broadband suppliers dropped their charges drastically to say, £4.99 a month for a 128K service, I think they'd see a huge increase in takeup.
3. Simon
"It seems incredible that they have ignored the fact there are more than one and a half million cable subscribers," said a BT spokesman
So what, there is no cable in the vast majority of the UK.
adding that there are "literally dozens" of ISPs reselling its own ADSL services.
Wow, so competition means "resellers of ONE product vying to sell at the lowest margin.
I honestly believe that in some ways, ADSL is now too cheap - there is no longer a business model for alternatives to selling BTs wholesale product, so almost all products look just like ... BTs wholesale product.
If there were genuine competition, there would be offerings with other than 250k upload speed (for example), even symmetic lines. Why isn't there ? Because BT doesn't want to sell such services as they would further kill it's leased line business. And why doesn't anyone else sell them ? Well there is no longer a business model for Local Loop Unbundling so no-one can afford to set up the kit to offer different services.
Just to put this in perspective, several years ago I was cold-called by a sales guy from Redstone suggesting that they planned to offer up to 8mbps symmetric lines, over copper, once LLU was available. Now the margins are too low to support LLU, such services have quietly disappeared from the salesmans patter.
Price isn't everything, choice and innovation have a place too.
4. Name Provided
Get a grip, people. Why should the uk gov't throw tax money at a privatised national comms infrastructure?! If BT wants to be treated as a private company, then they CANNOT have a state-protected advantage over competitive service organisations. So why has the uk gov't not taken away BT's ownership of 'the last mile'??? If you want tax money thrown into BBand, fine, but then put all BBand (and other telco services) providers on equal footing in the marketplace. BT can't have it both ways - own the network AND get tax money to built 'their' network. This country is too important to be run by politicians (who seem to have a total disregard of common sense) and Fat Cat corporate CEOs. What ever happened to common sense?
5. Dick Winchester
Firstly, ADSL isn't Broadband.. It's slightly broader narrowband. 1Gb/s is Broadband and what we should be aiming for..
Secondly, I've just gone through process of organising a BB Campaign up here in very rural Scotland and succeeded in getting our village and the next one up to target. The only company interested in helping us by providing tech info and other material was BT... None of the other providers would come near us until we reached our target levels. If these so called competitors bleating at the way BT behaves then they need to act like competition. Consequence is that we're advising all 400 and something that registered not to give house room to anyone but BT..
Thirdly, BT should probably never have been privatised in the first place. The UK doesn't have sufficient critical mass to sensibly support more than one telecomms company. If you want real technical progress then you need profitable companies able to invest in R&D... From a UK Plc standpoint you also need companies that will act as UK champions. Now, I would doubt that any of the actual BB hardware used by BT or the other companies is actually British... That's a consequence of privatisation. Not very clever.
6. Mike Gordon
I'm not sure that ADSL is too cheap or that ADSL is broadband . I'm also not sure that any other company in BTs position woudl act any differently .
What I am sure about though , is that the Government has done absolutely nothing in real terms to encourage competition is this area . As a consumer I expect to have access to goods or services BEFORE I pay for them , why shoudl this scenario be any different ? If the Government has money to spend and feels it needs to subsidise firms to get this ball rolling then I suggest it shoudl share it amongst BTs competitors to force BT move from it's position of demanding money before services .
7. roy evans
I agree with the above.......i origonaly thought bt was a problem.But i have to swallow my words! When bb got to my area i went to another isp to log on with. I have had nothing but slow speeds 170 kbps on average instead of the 512kbps i was promised by my isp. For the national tv campaign i thought, great, i,ll try them.what a shock i got. slower than advertised speed.no answeres to emails(well barely). crap service.on the issue of speed its been from 0.4kbps upload and 97kbps download.when my friends around me on bt have enjoyed glorious speeds around 480kbps consistently. i have only one thing to say after my isp "optimised" my pc with no diference or explanation or should i say "admitance" that they are totaly in a mess cos of greed for customers business at all costs.They say "we will be expanding and the work finnished by april 7th". So what!! So that they can clogg up the system and slow us all down again with new customers? Oh SOD IT! Come back BT, all is forgiven and sorry for the stick i give you.
8. anonymous
As mere consumers there is nothing we can do unless we form a protest group.
9. Knut Boehnert
As long as BT is in the wholesale business a monopolist that doesn't (or can't) upgrade the infrastructure to a 20th century standard (and yes, that means fibre) nothing will change.
The government fails in acknowledging two facts: 1) BT is in the wholesale business a monopolist and 2) this country is sub standard in the infrastructure provision.
In Germany the main telco was forced to open by law. Suddenly they invested into fibre and half of Germany had ugly holes everywhere for some years. The telco underwent a very big change from incumbent monopolist to (quite) lean 20th century major market leader.
BT still has to go through this process. They are not at all endangered in loosing their market leader position as they are protected by law.
10. Gabriele Griesbach
The Broadband market does not seem to be sufficiently competitive. Recent evidence from a new user of BT Broadband has revealed difficulties in getting a satisfactory installation, which has taken weeks to resolve. Based on this case, BT's customer service is not what one would expect from a provider who is aware of the competition.
11. Byron Pull
What is being stiffled is the roll out of Broadband to country districts. They are less profitable for BT, and these locations have suffered under investment both in base infrastructure and developments.
I can accept that BT needs to get things rolling in the high volume areas of the count first, but this cannot be used as an excuse now.
BT stop messing with pretend target levels and start providing a service!
12. anonymous
I agree with some of the comments about price. The cost of Broadband is too high. Untill it compares with unmetered dial up and has no restrictions like the so called cheap broadband of BT. Then it will never take off.
13. anonymous
Research '21cn' and you will find that BT is embarking on an expensive journey to provide this country with fast and efficient access to the web. 28 meg (if correctly reported) should fulfil everyone's requirements but the stumbling block could be OfCom who will, no doubt, look to safeguard the ethos of fair trade by stipulating exhorbitant prices. It appears easy to criticise a company just because they are large.
14. anonymous
The idea that broadband is too expensive is such nonsense. Look at how much cheaper it is than leased lines for a start. If people want more competition then they should accept higher prices that reflect the true cost of providing the service. Like someone else said the business model is fast dissapearing, particularly for the smaller ISPs. The result is fewer ISPs, with the market run by just a few big names that offer limited choice to the consumer.