On 22th November last, the Arcep adopted the procedures for allocating frequencies in the 3.5 Ghz band. Two days later, the government announced the reserve price below which it did not intend to transfer the first portion of spectrum dedicated to the 5G mobile network. And the operators make a face: the floor price seems far too high to them.

4 sets of 50 MHz allocated to each of the four operators at a fixed price of 350 million euros. Then 11 blocks of 10 Mhz that they will then compete at auction, bidding 70 million euros. 2.17 billion, while Orange, SFR, Bouygues Telecom and Free did not expect this reserve price to exceed The Arcep even campaigned for a prize of 1.5 billion "grand maximum".

In an interview at Les Echos, however, Agnès Pannier-Runacher presents this amount as "reasonable". In particular with regard to the sums paid by German or Italian operators. The representative of Bercy also argued that this figure corresponds to that determined by the Commission des Participations et Transferts, which "analyses the price below which the French people's assets do not seem to him to have to be sold".

A discourse that clashed with the operational and financial reality of 5G, reacted the operators. "This decision is not consistent with what has been put forward by the government in recent months," said Arthur Dreyfuss, President of the TFF. It constantly warns the State against a price boom that would deprive operators of the means to invest in deployment afterwards. Especially since the obligations assigned to them in return for the allocation of frequencies seem too ambitious.

5G frequencies too expensive: another dispute on the road to the future mobile network. Their disagreements relate not only to the reserve price, but also to the size of fixed-price blocks, the pace of deployment, 5G hedging obligations and the duration of licences. A non-exhaustive list of demands on which the regulator is far from having satisfied the Telecom Quartet.

Against the advice of Arcep, which favoured 60 MHz blocks, the state finally opted for 50 MHz. "With 50 MHz blocks, for a total of 310 MHz, the risk is that one operator will get twice as many frequencies as another," explained Sébastien Soriano, President of the Arcep, in Le Figaro. Bouygues Telecom and Free fear that they will lose out in the deal as they are less well equipped financially to bid higher.

Iliad also called for the removal of the third milestone in the deployment of 5G sites - 12,000 at the end of 2025 - for operators who would not obtain the famous 60 MHz. Arcep did not grant this right, but this obligation has been reduced to 10,500 sites. An adjustment reflecting the many criticisms encountered by the initial schedule. This assumed an acceleration of 1,000 sites per year from 2020 to 2022 and then to 2,500/year in 2023-2024 and 4,000/year in 2025 alone.

Bouygues Telecom, Orange and Free replied that they were unplayable, citing technical, financial and administrative constraints. Operators simply do not have the means to make the "leap" of 4,000 sites initially expected in 2025, argues Bouygues Telecom. For whom, moreover, "there is also no capacitive need of this magnitude on this horizon".

8,000 sites in 2024 and 10,500 in 2025 finally but not only in urban areas. The Arcep intends to ensure that the deployment of 5G will also benefit low-density areas, in line with government expectations. The regulator initially proposed to extend this obligation to the 22,000 municipalities of priority deployment areas (PDAs) as defined by the 2015 decision on the allocation of 700 MHz frequencies.

Again, there was no unanimity on this idea. Bouygues Telecom is not going about it in four ways: "Hedging obligations are very heavy and inconsistent with the object sold". For the operator, the 3.4-3.8 GHz band is intended for uses primarily for capacity, so that its use "is not relevant in sparsely populated areas".

Also mentioned by other actors, an approach consisting in prioritizing 5G deployments on "territories that we are sure will not benefit from FttH before a date to be determined". One of the approaches mentioned by Cerema or by the Assembly of French Departments is to use fixed 5G to compensate for future deficiencies in very high wireline broadband.

Finally, the opportunity to add the ZDP perimeter to the very recent list of "Industrial Territories" is suggested by several actors: Cerema again, but also Banque des Territoires or Orange. An addition finally retained by the Arcep in its specifications.

The last point of contention on the part of operators is the granting of 5G licences for an initial period of only fifteen years, which can be extended by five years after the Arcep's assessment. The Authority considers that this period is "appropriate to the level of investment required to fulfil the obligations under the procedure". Not Orange, Bouygues Telecom and SFR: the trio believes that this will not be enough to make their investments profitable.

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Source : DegroupNews

Kosc Telecom was the solution devised by the public authorities to bring more competition to the business telecoms market. Just three years after its launch, Kosc is expected to file for bankruptcy leaving a slate of 120 million euros.

After the merger with SFR, Kosc acquired part of the activities of Numericable (Completel). Bpifrance had injected 9 million euros and OVH was also a shareholder via a contribution "in industry". The idea was to make Kosc the third man in the lucrative telecom business market, 85% owned by Orange and SFR.

In 2018, Caisse des Dépôts et Consignation had in turn promised to provide 20 million euros to Kosc. It was without counting on a grain of sand: a lawsuit lost to SFR and the threat of having to pay it 20 million euros. For the Caisse, the risk was too high and decided to withdraw from the case, leading to the fall of the telecom operator.

A new game should be played at the helm of the commercial court, with potential buyers. Indeed, the telecoms sector has evolved since 2016 and Free and Bouygues Telecom have in turn launched themselves into the business market. Bouygues' subsidiary would also be a serious candidate for the takeover of Kosc, and would therefore be favoured by OVH.

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Source : Le Figaro

According to the Financial Times, Orange is preparing to split its mobile tower business, the pylons where 3G/4G equipment for mobile phone use is installed, into a separate entity. This could be a prelude to a partial or total sale later on. A new entity that can be valued between €8 and €10.3 billion. Stéphane Richard's group has the largest number of antennas in France (15,000 in total), and one of the largest in Europe (59,000 antennas on the Old Continent, in Africa and in the Middle East).

Orange will inform about its projects during its investor day scheduled for December 4, according to sources in the Financial Times. Its CEO stated last May that "the current appetite for infrastructure funds clearly reveals the intrinsic value of telecom networks". The French operator must ask itself the question of "maximizing the value" of its infrastructure, he said at the time.

This type of split and sale is a cash movement of telecom operators in search of cash. Last August, Free sold 70% of Iliad Tower Co. In 2018, SFR (Altice) partially sold SFR TowerCo while Bouygues Telecom initiated the movement in 2016 with two disposals for a total amount of 700 million euros.

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Source : BFM Business

When SFR was acquired by Numéricable in 2014, the parent company, Altice, made a number of commitments to the French Competition Authority in order to better promote this concentration in the telecoms sector. These commitments, which were entered into for a period of five years, should no longer be maintained, the gendarme said at the end of this period, on 28 October. With one exception: the agreement to co-develop the fibre in very dense areas concluded with Bouygues before the acquisition.

The French Competition Authority has therefore released Altice from several of its commitments concerning:

• the obligation to open the cable network to other operators, and not to use the information available to Altice to deploy its fibre network.
• the prohibition on offering cable offers in La Poste branches with which SFR had a distribution agreement.
• the maintenance of dark fibre (FON) or dedicated optical local loop (BLOD) offers "at least as advantageous as before the operation".

On the other hand, the competition police officer was more picky about the Faber contract concluded between SFR and Bouygues Telecom in 2010. A co-delivery agreement for the horizontal fibre optic network in 22 cities located in very dense areas (including Paris). Especially since Altice was called to order in 2017 because of "particularly serious breaches" of the execution of this contract. 40 million fine and injunctions to comply with deployment commitments co-financed by Bouygues Telecom.

The Authority decided to lift part of the injunctions: those, without penalty, requiring Altice to connect the buildings concerned by the agreement as from the 2017 decision. The competition police officer considers that Altice's interests are now "aligned with those of Bouygues Telecom" within the scope of the Faber contract. The parent company now favours FttH.

On the other hand, the injunctions under penalty payments for the stock of buildings that were to be fibrated before 2017 are maintained. The Authority is examining the progress of Patrick Drahi's group to determine whether it should also be released from these commitments. Its conclusions will be issued "in the first half of 2020".

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Source : DegroupNews

In early June, AOTA, the Association of Alternative Telecommunications Operators, called on the government to "address the transition to IPv6 and the preservation of the competitive balance".

The Directorate General for Enterprise (DGE) has just replied: "the transition to this new communication protocol now appears to be a major challenge for competitiveness and innovation". However, it states that "the government's capacity to act in this area is limited by the lack of a legislative basis to regulate this type of resource, as IP addresses are managed at the international level by ICANN and allocated directly at the European level by the European Internet registry, the Amsterdam-based RIPE NCC".

To find a solution, "the French authorities will propose to the Presidency of the Council of the European Union that it put the issue of the transition to IPv6 on the agenda of a working group of the Telecommunications and Information Society Council and that it refer the matter to the Body of European Regulators for Electronic Communications (BEREC) for its opinion".

Despite a "timid response", the AOTA welcomes the fact that the State is taking the issue seriously. The Chief Electoral Officer also points out that the Arcep can play a supporting role in facilitating the transition to IPv6, and that a "task force" will soon be set up by the Arcep on this subject".

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Source : Next Inpact

Free had been involved for several years in co-financing the FTTH networks deployed by Orange and was challenging several terms of its contract with the incumbent operator. The Regulatory Authority had settled this dispute in Free's favour, but Orange had been challenging the legality of the dispute since then. The Paris Court of Appeal upheld Arcep's decision in an order dated 26th September 2019.

The planned renewal of the term and conditions of access to Orange's infrastructure was contested by Free. Arcep confirmed that they did not meet Free's needs for visibility and transparency and therefore imposed on Orange to grant a right of access for a defined period of time and at least 40 years. In its decision, the Court of Appeal confirmed that these conditions are "not sufficiently precise in view of Free's need for visibility over the effective duration of this right".

In addition, Arcep considered that it was justified and reasonable for Free to obtain information on the formation of access tariffs for Orange FTTH networks in less dense private initiative areas. This was also supported by the Court of Appeal, which stated that these tariffs were "directly linked to the financial terms of the bid, which it seeks to ensure is fair".

Finally, the Regulatory Authority considered that the incumbent operator should allow Free to connect mobile base stations in less dense areas of private initiative via the extra optical fibres of the FTTH network deployed by Orange and co-financed by Free. A point that has not been contested by Orange in its appeal.

In addition, the Paris Court of Appeal held that the decision did not affect business confidentiality and confirmed Arcep's analysis. And noting that the information that Orange must provide to Free pursuant to the decision "is characterized by a very high degree of aggregation, both geographically and by expense items".

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Source : Le Monde Informatique

The wholesale-only operator Kosc is in the spotlight. Its president, Yann de Prince, confirmed that there are only a few weeks left to find a solution to his financial problems at his hearing in early October by the Senate.

"As the company had not yet reached operating balance, and could not therefore in principle convince the court of its ability to continue its activity, it was logical that we should proceed, not with a suspension of payment, but with outright liquidation," explained the director of the alternative wholesale operator.

"The process I have initiated gives the company a very short period of time, two months, to try to overcome its difficulties," he said. Yann de Prince mandated the Rothschild investment bank in early September to "find investors or any partner who could help save or take over the company".

"The outcome of the process initiated at the beginning of September is set for the end of October 2019. It may be extended for a further two months. Its main condition is the payment of the next salaries. This payment itself depends on a new commitment by shareholders or the lifting of SFR's seizures. If one or the other does not come true, we will probably no longer avoid the pitfall of liquidation," said Kosc's boss.

Facing serious cash flow problems, the operator has indeed seen its horizon darken considerably in recent weeks. The operator is uncertain following the Competition Authority's unfavourable decision concerning the takeover of Completel's DSL network, previously held by SFR, and the withdrawal of one of its major investors, Banque des territoires.

"Kosc is in a blocking situation at this time. On September 27, 2019, using the ADLC's decision as an instrument in the middle of a discussion process with creditors, SFR proceeded to a protective seizure of the company's accounts and all trade receivables. As a result, Kosc no longer has any liquidity. Bailiffs regularly come to our offices. From the end of October, it will face the problem of salary payments unless our shareholders intervene further," said Kosc's Director of Financial Control and Regulatory Affairs.

It is now time for an emergency. "Kosc's situation is now simple: either in the coming weeks, the shareholders will be sufficiently convinced and will decide to provide sufficient funds to allow the company to regain a certain margin of manoeuvre, necessary for the implementation of a sustainable solution, or the company will be liquidated or sold," explained its president.

Especially since OVH, one of its historical investors, could well play the role of the girl of the air since the telecom activities are no longer a priority for him.
But the operator has no shortage of contenders for its takeover. The operator's president thus stated "Despite a most unfavourable situation, despite the urgency with which these possible partners are asked to position themselves, sixteen[candidates] have already expressed themselves" by specifying that they are mainly industrial partners.

Bouygues Telecom and Iliad could be candidates for this takeover. This information should still be taken on a conditional basis, but it might seem plausible when both operators have views on this lucrative market.

 Read the article

Source : ZDNet

The operator has launched the marketing of its Very High Speed subscriptions, up to 1 Gb/s, in many cities. To do so, it relied on SFR's FttH network. These are AMII zones, moderately dense zones, where the red square operator is the only one to manoeuvre. It installs a shared optical fibre network there, which other ISPs will then be able to use.


More than 50 cities in some 15 departments are affected by the arrival of Bouygues Telecom's offers. The operator is thus following in Free's footsteps, which has been investing in these territories for several months now.

Bouygues Telecom, which has not been present so far, seems to have launched a vast marketing effort since the end of September. In particular on the outskirts of major cities such as Calais, Cannes, Marignane, Nantes, Toulon, Toulouse and Orléans as well as in several major municipalities in the Ile-de-France region.


In these regions, competition will therefore be somewhat fiercer since at the beginning of the year only SFR, RED, Orange and Sosh offers were available. For several months now, Free has been growing in power, so it is not surprising to see Bouygues Telecom complete the picture. This is to keep pace with these territories with hundreds of thousands of potential customers.


At the same time, Bouygues Telecom is whipping up new ground in major cities. At the beginning of 2019, its very high speed Internet offers were still absent from many large cities located in so-called very dense areas (ZTD). But the situation is gradually improving with the arrival of its fibre in Cannes, Clermont-Ferrand, Grenoble, Poitiers, Rennes, Rouen, Saint-Etienne, Toulon or even some Ile-de-France municipalities such as very recently Fontenay-sous-Bois.

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Source : Ariase

Arcep still estimated, before the summer holidays, that the number of public IPv4 addresses available would allow it to last until March 2020. But since then, requests for allocations have multiplied and the remaining stock is melting like snow in the sun. The exhaustion date is now scheduled.... November 5th, 2019.

After this date, the European RIPE register will switch to a strict rationing mode. Organizations wishing to provide themselves will therefore have to register on the waiting list. If so, they will receive a small range of 256 addresses. For those who already have address ranges, they have almost no chance of receiving this boost. "We will focus on players who have not yet received an IPv4 address allocation," warns Marco Schmidt, head of rule development and internal policy at RIPE.

These addresses will mainly come from companies in bankruptcy. Historical actors who have received a large allocation in the past and who no longer use certain beaches can obviously return them to RIPE. But this case will be quite rare. "IPv4 addresses have become strategic assets. Almost no one will want to part with it," says Vincentus Grinius, CEO of Heficed.

The number of IP address transfers is not expected to increase significantly in the future for the same reasons as seen above. However, the price of the IPv4 address could increase significantly as the offer becomes scarcer. There are currently about twenty bids at the global level on the auction site auctions.ipv4.global. The average purchase price more than doubled from $9 to $21 in three years.

This shortage is already inspiring fraudulent minds who are on the lookout to recover stocks of IPv4 addresses. In recent years, a few hundred cases have already landed on the RIPE offices.
RIPE has therefore strengthened its controls to remedy this situation. More than 600 surveys, twice as many as the previous year, were conducted in 2018. Members are now asked to check regularly that their data is correct and up to date.

However, this will not solve the fundamental problem of shortage. Today, no telecom player can ignore IPv4. Even if IPv6 is developing, this technology only connects about a quarter of the Web. "The Internet will not stop working, but it will stop growing. This shortage will especially affect new entrants and growing players, as they are the ones who need new public IPv4 addresses the most. Either they manage to obtain them on the secondary market, or they will have to share IPv4 addresses with several customers," explains Vivien Guéant, project manager in Arcep's "Open Internet" unit.

This situation is far from neutral for the end user as it affects the quality of service. Indeed, when an operator retrieves IPv4 addresses from an actor located in another country or continent, it may happen that this geographical information is not updated.

Address sharing also has shortcomings since it allows several hundred or even thousands of clients to be connected to a single IPv4 address. And this significantly complicates maintenance for the operator and makes it difficult, if not impossible, to use certain applications "such as peer-to-peer, remote access to shared files on a NAS, access to connected home control systems, certain network games", explains Arcep in its "Monitoring the exhaustion of IPv4 addresses".

The police also suffer from this forced sharing. Investigations will be difficult to complete if addresses are increasingly shared, as it often relies on an IP address to find a digital offender. To overcome this situation, European police forces would like operators and ISPs to reduce the number of customers shared per IPv4 address. In Belgium, for example, the telecoms industry has played the game and the introduction of a code of conduct has made it possible to limit the subscriber ratio to 16:1.

The only long-term solution is the widespread use of IPv6. "Industry players have never seen much interest in IPv6, as this technology had no immediate effects: all websites and customers that have IPv6 also have IPv4. IPv6 is only useful if everyone gets involved. IPv4 will probably have to be kept for a long time to come. Some even think that IPv4 will never stop," adds Vivien Guéant. Unless we do like Belarus, which has just issued a presidential decree requiring these ISPs to deploy IPv6 to all users by 1 January 2020. To date, it is the only country to force the deployment of IPv6 through legislation.

 Read the article

Source : 01net

The telecoms police officer has just sent an early formal notice to Orange, SFR, Bouygues Telecom and Iliad-Free regarding the "New Mobile Deal". Indeed, Arcep considers that the commitments made by operators under this agreement, dating from January 2018, are not progressing fast enough.

At the time, the State agreed to renew part of the frequencies granted to operators for ten years and free of charge. A "gift" with a counterpart, however: the operators had undertaken to cover the territory more, particularly in the famous "white areas".

By the end of 2020, they must have converted all their existing 2G and 3G sites to 4G and improve mobile coverage on transport routes (from 2018) and inside buildings (from 2019).

But a year and a half after the signing, the regulator would find that progress was insufficient. "The regulator has no confidence in the operators, he believes that this case is dragging on," explains a source familiar with the case.

If the targets were not met by the 2020 deadline, early warning would make it possible to initiate sanctions more quickly without wasting time.

Aware that operators have always had difficulty meeting their commitments, the government has organised progress reports on the progress of the work. This was obviously not enough.

However, in June 2018, the government published the first 485 sites on which operators had to install their 4G antennas. For its part, the Arcep had launched its quarterly dashboard. But several observers had already warned of the magnitude of the task. "The deadlines were super-short. We could legitimately be concerned," recalls one participant today.

Operators, on the other hand, deny any delay. "Operators are deploying on schedule. ...] We are on the ground every day to solve administrative and technical challenges with the support of communities and government services. Arcep is welcome in the territories and will thus become even more aware of the collective success underway to finally solve the problem of white areas," said Arthur Dreyfuss, President of the French Telecommunications Federation. Summer is therefore likely to be turbulent.

 Read the article

Source : Les Echos

Heat episodes are not taken lightly by data center operators. In France, "we have gone from 40 degrees to 46 degrees in a few years. We have met the specifications of Spain," says Marie Chabanon, Technical Director of DATA4 Group.

In order to counter any heat stroke, the datacenters' resistance to temperatures has increased " The great fear is the domino effect [...] If all or part of the cold infrastructure has problems, it affects the rest of the equipment. And if the refrigeration unit stops, it's the worst thing that can happen to us with the complete power outage," added Fabrice Coquio, Interxion's Managing Director. A risk also linked to the quality of RTE or Enedis' electricity distribution. "We must anticipate a risk of electrical loss or incident," explains Marie Chabanon.

But data center operators have a secret boot to fight this domino effect. "Data center electrical systems are built to be 100% operational. However, this is never the case. The consequence is that in the event of a load, such as a higher cold demand, we have unallocated power that we can use," explains Fabien Gautier of Equinix. This is called capacity redundancy.

Especially since the densification of computing power per unit of space in recent years, with the democratization of virtualization, has led to more consumption and more heat. "With 14 or 15 kvA berries, we cause hot spots, which are more sensitive to heat waves," explains Fabien Gautier. The work of urbanizing the IT architecture deployed in the rooms is therefore essential. "Our work is therefore the urbanization of the rooms. If they were completed on the fly, that can be a problem," he adds.

This involves, among other things, load balancing. "Our data centers are designated with redundancies and a 50% load rate. The backup machines will be used to provide additional power" in the event of a heat wave, says Marie Chabanon. Nevertheless, it must be anticipated. "We must ensure that backup systems are ready to be operational, through maintenance and control actions on backup equipment."

The protection of data centers against heat also requires the installation of curative systems. "We installed water spray systems to water the roof equipment with water that is not too cold," says Fabrice Coquio.

And to be prepared for any eventuality in the early evening, the schedule of the technicians present on site has been modified. It is also necessary to warn customers so that they are careful.

Recent advances in hardware strength and data center design have made it possible to increase the temperatures in server storage rooms. "The idea is that the lower the PUE (Power Usage Effectiveness), the better it performs. Ten years ago, we used to make datacenters where it was difficult to achieve a PUE of 1.6. Today we are at 1.2 and we are getting closer to 1, which represents 20% savings by playing on the temperature and energy performance of the new equipment," says Marie Chabanon. As a result, the cooling system now focuses on machines with forced air. There is no longer any need to refrigerate entire rooms.

"We are seeing an evolution in the design of indoor temperature according to the recommendations of the Ashrae (American Society of Heating and Ventilating Engineers). The idea is to work well with much higher temperature ranges. We have gone from 20 to 22 degrees to 18 to 27 degrees," she adds. Since 2011, these standards have been raised: they recommend blowing at 26 degrees on the front panel on indoor equipment. "The humidity level was also modified [...] In 2008, it was between 40 and 60%. It is now 70%," says Fabrice Coquio.

This will limit cooling costs without affecting the resistance of the installations. A critical point in hot weather.

 Read the article

Source : ZDNet

After a first meeting on January 29th, the second is planned for July 2th at Challes-les-Eaux.

Theme: HSBB in the Alps

Departments concerned: 38; 73; 74 and 01 (South Jura) with a focus on tourist areas (ski resorts, hotels).

Observation:

Broadband needs are exploding with the advent of "Over The Top" (OTT) networks and the strong growth of services such as Amazon Prime Video, Netflix, OCS, MyCanal...
Initial observations between the 2017 and 2018 Christmas holidays show a +60% increase in the throughput consumed in hotels and hotel residences. For these establishments, connections in Mbs will soon no longer be enough and requests in 1, 2, 3 or even 4 Gbs are beginning to arrive.

Work in synergy:

From now on, it is essential for telecom and Internet operators to organise themselves in order to be able to respond effectively to this need, which was yesterday emerging and is now very present.
This is the objective of yALPA! We must encourage the actors of Very High Speed deployment to meet and get to know each other better in order to consider future collaborations rather than planning, each on its own, investments in the same places.
The local DSPs (38, 73 and 74) do part of the work, but simply changing departments is complicated. Let us bet that by exchanging informally, a collective intelligence will make it possible to accelerate the arrival of really Very High Speed offers in the Alps (resorts but also valleys and plains).
It is understood that the results of these initial yALPA discussions will not have immediate effect. However, in the more or less short term, the problems currently encountered in terms of HSBB in tourist areas can be solved.

Morning program (9:00 am - 12:00 pm):

• welcome, coffee, pastries
• round table discussion: presentation of each participant
• Transalpinet presentation (study by Rezopole)
• room for improvement:
  • common carto tool.... Should we start where we wait another 10 years?
  • new backbone offers from external operators
  • territories without POPs

Registrations:

from Samuel Triolet (director of Rezopole) : striolet (from) rezopole.net

Practical informations:

See you on July 2nd at 9:00 am at Hub des Alpes (salle Altitude 193) - 37 avenue des Massettes, 73190 Challes-les-Eaux.

In the fight expected from operators for the acquisition of frequencies dedicated to 5G, the Regulatory Authority for Electronic Communications and Posts is preparing to open a new front. Indeed, last weekend Arcep reported that it had set 31 December 2022 as the maximum deadline for frequencies in the 1.5 GHz band, known as the L band.

"Today used for point-to-point links for the collection of mobile networks open to the public and professionals and by the Ministries of the Interior and Defence", its release by the end of 2022 should allow mobile operators to have more frequencies to deploy future 5G and Very High Speed networks.

"The 1.5 GHz band has been subject to European harmonisation since 2015. It has 90 MHz that can be used to meet downlink requirements. The propagation properties of these frequencies are particularly interesting for the coverage of the territory and the coverage inside buildings", said the Telecom Constable.

However, there could be many pitfalls.... Indeed, the current tenants of the band have already sent comments to the Authority during the consultation period: a disputed reallocation plan, potentially huge migration costs.

However, the decision is widely welcomed by operators who are pleased to be able to obtain new frequency blocks for the development of their future 5G networks. While the latter accept that this L-band will only be operated "for additional exclusively downlink links (in SDL mode)", it will still improve the throughput and capacity of downlinks below 1 GHz.

The spectrum available for the deployment of future 5G networks is relatively limited, so this release should be of significant interest to operators, particularly in the event of coupling with other frequency bands.

Operators are also unanimous that the entire band will not be able to operate effectively due to unfavourable neighbourhood conditions. On its adjacent bands, there are "space exploration satellite services, radio astronomy and space research services", which do not allow the use of both ends of the 1.5 GHz band. Orange has only one 85 MHz band that can be used, while Free goes further with only one 40 MHz band. For the operator, this block of frequencies constitutes "the only sub-band with a mature ecosystem today" and could even be the subject of an "immediate allocation scenario" via a reallocation of 10 MHz bands to each operator.

A scenario that will not be retained by Arcep but which illustrates the operators' appetite for this band, to the great displeasure of its current tenants. They should be required to be housed elsewhere, particularly in the 6 GHz band.

Most of these actors are industrialists and express doubts about the Arcep's decision and its implications for their own activities and finances. Questions about the economic viability of this migration on the part of EDF, for example, for whom "the estimated time required to replace 1.4 GHz links, without significantly impacting the company's performance, is around ten years".

Especially since the timetable imposed by the telecoms police officer is already causing the actors concerned to shudder. For Enedis, the deadlines proposed jointly by Brussels and Arcep "do not take into account this specific framework for the use of the 1.4 GHz band by Enedis, nor the current limits or the constraints imposed by the alternative solutions". And even one of the alternatives proposed by Arcep would involve the reconstruction of a large part of its network.

The public authorities also seem to be waiting, as does the Ministry of Transport, for whom the timetable mentioned cannot be kept. Hence the Ministry's request to maintain the current network "at least until 2027, knowing that if studies show that it is possible to have the future network available earlier, the network can be shut down before that date".

Current tenants propose other solutions such as the establishment of a "cohabitation context". This would allow L-band frequencies to be allocated to operators in dense urban areas and other actors to "continue to use Radio Beams in rural areas, which are less likely to be targeted by the need for SDL".

 Read the article

Source : ZDNet

With the objective of 3 million eligible fibre sockets by the end of the year in these Public Initiative Networks located mainly in rural areas, the operator announced on Tuesday the finalisation of an agreement for the marketing of its fibre offers on the RIPs allocated to Covage.

At the end of this agreement, Orange will be able to roll out its services on certain FTTH networks in Covage: Calvados, Essonne, Haute-Savoie, Hérault, Seine-et-Marne, Somme, Lille and the Dunkirk Urban Community.

Last March, Orange's management claimed a 30% market share in RIPs but is now aiming to take the lion's share on these networks. This approach will necessarily involve partnerships with infrastructure operators specialising in the deployment of these RIPs, such as Covage. The company operates 46 public or private networks and currently covers 2.3 million sockets.

Orange had 350,000 own catches this winter in sparsely populated areas. To reach its target of 900,000 own-access catches in RIPs by the end of the year, the future will therefore depend on partnerships. The incumbent operator wishes to increase the share of catches purchased from partners in these areas to 2 million by the end of 2019. The issue is well understood by Orange, as evidenced by the conclusion of this partnership with Covage.

 Read the article

Source : ZDNet

France's leading Internet service providers ranked it as one of the largest consumers of bandwidth a year ago. These groups, such as Google, Netflix, Akamai, Facebook, take advantage of the tips of French operators without paying their fair share.

The French Telecoms Federation (FFT) and its president are therefore calling for "more equity". In an interview with Le Figaro, Arthur Dreyfuss explains that "80% of the taxes paid in France by digital players are paid by French telecom operators. At certain times of the day, 80% of telecom network traffic is due to YouTube, Netflix, Amazon and Facebook".

Under these conditions, the FFT proposes to introduce a toll, i.e. to charge for access to the networks of French operators. As these pipes are extremely profitable for American giants, access providers are wondering when they will participate in financing the infrastructure. Indeed, ISPs must constantly invest in expanding and improving their networks. These are therefore heavy financing for which the Internet giants participate little or not at all.

This proposal does not come about by chance since the government wants to introduce a tax on the advertising activities of the largest digital companies. It should be implemented very quickly since it has just been voted by the Senate.

 Read the article

Source : Journal du Geek