Even if the deployment of fibre optics is beating all records, there are still many hurdles to overcome in order to guarantee very high speed broadband.

Starting with the quality of service, a subject that continues to mobilise the authorities. The failure rate for final connections is still around 17%, compared with 25% a few months ago. Although there is some improvement on this front and the 'noodle dishes' in the mutualisation points and the optical connection points are tending to decrease, the situation is not without irritation for Cedric O.

When questioned, the Secretary of State for Digital Affairs did not mince his words against infrastructure operators, who are in charge of deploying fibre optics on the territory. "If qualitatively, things seem to be going a little better, we are not at the end of the story," he said, before pointing to the responsibility of Orange and XpFibre (ex-SFR FttH) in this matter.

The two operators have still not ratified the new version of the subcontracting contract with the commercial operator (STOC), unlike their competitors - Altitude, Axione and TDF. Implemented a few months ago, the V2 of this contractual framework is intended to restore order to relations between building operators, commercial operators and their subcontractors.

Although the delay accumulated by XpFibre and Orange in signing the STOC V2 contract should soon be resolved, the infrastructure operators still have work to do to remedy the defects in the final connection. This problem of the quality of final connections is not new. A working group set up by Arcep on the subject was already reporting in 2019 on "significant rates of defects in the execution of final connection and cross-connection operations at the point of mutualisation".

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Source : ZDNet

One of the main transatlantic cable projects concerning France has just "landed" on a beach at Porge, near Bordeaux. The project was initiated by Facebook and built by Alcatel Submarine Networks. Orange, partner for the French part, was responsible for the operation. This required horizontal drilling 20 metres below the beach and the dune, in order to limit the impact on the environment and in particular the forest.

Named "Amitié", this cable links Massachusetts in the United States to Porge in France and Bude in England. It is 6,800 km long and carries a total of 16 pairs of optical fibres. It is scheduled to come into service in early 2022.

The French incumbent will benefit from two fibre pairs on this cable and will be responsible for the operation and maintenance of the "landing station". Orange will provide the terrestrial links from this station to Bordeaux, then Paris and Lyon, and finally the rest of Europe. It also states that the cable will enable new data centres to be set up in the Bordeaux area.

Another transatlantic cable, "Dunant", was recently commissioned in the Vendée by Google. With traffic between Europe and North America doubling on average every two years, investment in new infrastructure is needed to absorb the increase. Between them, "Dunant" and "Amitié" will have more capacity than any previous transatlantic cable.

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Source : L'Usine Digitale

After being condemned for its commercial practices concerning its 4G and 5G mobile packages three weeks ago, Orange has been rapped on the knuckles again. This time it is its practices in terms of the application - and especially the presentation - of the two-year legal guarantee of conformity that has led the Direction Départementale de la Protection des Populations (DDPP) of Val-de-Marne to crack down.

The French administration reproached the historical operator for presenting this two-year legal guarantee, which was made compulsory in 2016, as an offer specific to the operator, and not as a legally imposed guarantee. Orange has therefore been required to display a message to remind the public authorities that this guarantee is above all the result of their work.

The operator is also called upon to put its commercial offers in order, in particular by adding this famous missing term "legal guarantee", which does not appear on its labels and displays in its physical shops. The administration also points out that the omission of this legal notice may lead Orange subscribers not to enforce their rights.

Far from being a first for the incumbent, the latter has recently been condemned for similar omissions. On 27 July, it was convicted of "knowingly failing" to present in "satisfactory conditions the restrictions on use" of 4G and 5G services. A fine of €15,000 was imposed by the Paris judicial court for having forgotten to present the actual availability of the 5G network on French territory, as well as the minimum speeds actually available for the new generation of mobile technology to its customers.

This sentence followed a writ of summons from the association Consommation Logement Cadre de vie (CLCV), for whom the omission of these details amounted to knowingly misleading consumers potentially interested in trying out the new generation of mobile technology and taking advantage of the explosion in speeds so much vaunted by the promoters of 5G.

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Source : ZDNet

On 22 July, the government presented the results of its audit on the vast telephone network breakdown that rendered emergency numbers inaccessible for several hours on 2 June. And the conclusion is clear: "There were shortcomings on the part of Orange".

In the report submitted by Anssi, IGA, Igas, the CGE and the SEAC, the sequence of events is the same as that already set out by Orange in its own investigation. Namely, the failure occurred on Wednesday 2 June, at 4:45 pm, during a maintenance operation on a telephone network equipment.

Technically, the malfunction is due to an equipment of the network called "calls servers", gateways allowing the interconnection between the old switched telephone network and the fibre network carrying the internet data. This is a mandatory step for calls made from a Wi-Fi phone to a landline, or from another operator's mobile phone to emergency numbers. The report states: "The malfunction of the equipment was caused by a manipulation by the operator, which triggered a software bug blocking the equipment and rendering it uncontrollable".

Anssi insists on the conjunction of three factors, namely firstly "somewhat hazardous [computer] commands issued by Orange", i.e. technical manipulations for an operation to improve the call server but carried out "in an unusual order" by the technician. Then, these same commands were replicated "in a very short time" on all the call servers. This is where the "bug" in the equipment supplied by the service provider Italtel "appeared", a bug that "is not the responsibility of Orange".

The agency also noted "a certain slowness in Orange's reaction" and "a lack of technical advice on its part" towards the various emergency services.

In total, around 3 million calls were not completed, including 11,800 to emergency numbers. The incident probably had dramatic consequences: judicial or administrative investigations have been opened into six deaths that occurred during the outage. "Orange took nearly an hour to become aware that the outage was affecting emergency services in particular, two hours to inform the authorities and nearly three hours to put in place an appropriate system," the report said.

Cédric O also indicates that "the government will refer the matter to Arcep in the next few days to study the consequences", potentially legal. Telecoms operators are in fact obliged to carry calls, particularly emergency calls, and to maintain the security and integrity of networks.

In addition, by the end of September, new recommendations for the management of emergency numbers will be established, to be implemented by operators. This will be accompanied by a future crisis exercise.

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Source : L'Obs

For about seven hours on the evening of 2 June, the numbers for the Samu (15), the police (17), the fire brigade (18) and the single European emergency number (112) were virtually inaccessible. Orange, through its CEO Stéphane Richard, had then presented "its deepest apologies". Then, early this morning, on 4 June, the historical operator announced that it had launched an "in-depth" internal investigation.

This announcement preceded the meeting of the interministerial crisis unit. "Things are back in order" and "the situation is back under control as I speak", declared Jean Castex at around 9am, at the end of this meeting which he chaired.

"We deplore the victims who may have been caused by this serious incident", confirmed the Prime Minister.

The head of government insisted that "it will be necessary to establish very clearly the cause of the events that occurred and above all the means to ensure that they do not happen again."

For the time being, Orange has already launched an in-depth internal investigation. The telephone operator's general inspectorate "will have to carry out the necessary investigations to identify the precise causes of this incident and issue recommendations to draw all the necessary lessons", Orange said.

Conclusions are expected within seven days. "In connection with the interministerial crisis unit, we set up yesterday evening a dedicated unit to resolve any local malfunctions that might appear," added the telephone operator, while "disturbances" still remained on 3 June "in a random manner".

When asked about the origin of this breakdown, Stéphane Richard already ruled out the hypothesis of a cyber attack. This incident is "more likely" due to "a software failure in (the) critical network equipment", i.e. the platforms responsible for routing calls.

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Source : Les Echos

After long negotiations, the government and Orange have just agreed on an action plan to improve the quality of service of the copper network. Indeed, even if the deployment of optical fibre is progressing rapidly, the 22 million French people who still have an active line based on this network must not be overlooked.

The plan therefore provides for an additional 10 million euros to be committed to 17 priority territories, as well as 123 new posts in departments under pressure and a 30% increase in national crisis response staff.

The incumbent operator will have to provide a back-up solution within a maximum of 24 hours from the time the incident is reported, provided there is mobile coverage. If the mobile network is not sufficient, a satellite connection will be made available from the town halls.

Local consultation committees will be set up to improve consultation between Orange and elected representatives. A national consultation committee will also include representatives of the Commission Supérieure du Numérique et des Postes (CSNP), representatives of associations of local authorities and government departments.

It should be remembered that the total dismantling of the copper network will begin in 2023 and will extend until 2030, as fibre optic coverage of the territory progresses.

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Source : 01net

With more than 33,000 consumer alerts via the "J alerte l'Arcep" platform in 2020, the telecoms regulator reveals a 37.5% increase in complaints compared to 2019.

Among the 4 operators (Orange, SFR, Bouygues Telecom and Free), the worst performer was Free, generating the most negative requests from the French. It thus takes the place of SFR. In detail, Bouygues Telecom had 19 alerts per 100,000 customers. This compares to 25 for Orange, 26 for SFR and 29 for Free.

The French have used the Internet much more in 2020, with the various confinements, and have noticed many problems. "This year again, the most frequent complaints received concern the quality of service, including after-sales service. Next comes dissatisfaction with network developments (fibre rollout, insufficient mobile coverage, etc.), in particular fibre rollout, followed by operators' commercial practices and difficulties encountered when changing operators", explains Arcep.

Generally speaking, French people's satisfaction has fallen. If the average for operators was 7.65/10 in 2019, it was 7.5/10 in 2020.

The biggest differences are in fixed-line services. SFR customers give SFR a satisfaction rating of 6.8/10 compared to 7.5/10 for Orange.

For mobile, the scores range from 7.4 for SFR to 7.8 for Orange and Free.

While the operators' customer services are generally poorly rated. Free does well with a 2.6/5, while SFR closes the bench with a pitiful 1.8/5.

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Source : Journal du Geek

Arcep published its observatory of commercial 5G deployments on April 14th. As of March 31th, operators have commercially opened 12,917 5G sites, including 2,838 in the 3.5 GHz band. While analysis of the operators' curves shows that no one is neglecting the fifth-generation technology, not all are moving at the same pace.

With nearly 13,000 sites open in 5G in France at the end of March, mobile network deployment is steady. In just a few months, operators have secured coverage for millions of potential subscribers, and Arcep is even talking about "steady progress for the first few months of 2021."

Orange has activated the most sites and antennas in the 5G "core band" with 1,105 sites in 3.5 GHz. The incumbent operator is also supporting this deployment with 2.1 GHz technology (medium frequencies), enabling speeds equivalent to 4G since it exploits a band already in operation. By 2023, this middle band will provide access to new 5G services in current 4G areas.

Free Mobile continues to do well. Although the operator founded by Xavier Niel has activated fewer 3.5 GHz sites than Orange (824 vs. 1,105), it is the operator that has opened the most sites in France: 8,074 in total, i.e. 1,030 additional sites in one month, compared with 338 for Orange.

Unlike its three competitors, Free is still betting heavily on low frequencies (700 MHz). More than 7,000 sites have been opened in this band, which has lower bandwidths but has the advantage of penetrating buildings better.

As for the other two operators. Bouygues Telecom is still ahead of SFR, and even Orange in the total number of sites, from a statistical point of view. The operator - a subsidiary of the French construction giant - has activated a total of 2,263 sites, including 491 in 3.5 GHz and 2,091 in 2.1 GHz.

In terms of the number of 5G sites opened in 3.5 GHz, SFR is on a par with Bouygues Telecom with a total of 418. But the operator with the red square is clearly behind for the additional sites. Indeed, it has commercially opened 778 sites in 2.1 GHz. That is a total of 1 196 activated 5G sites all frequencies combined. This places SFR quite far from its first competitor.

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Source : Clubic

In Lévis Saint Nom, in the Yvelines department, a team of Orange technicians is working to remove the overhead copper lines in the town. This experiment should prepare the great operation of "decommissioning" of copper that will concern the whole country from 2023.

Drawn from the sixties and especially in the seventies, copper lines have brought telephone service to the French. They then allowed access to the Internet via ADSL technology in the late 90s. In December 2020, Arcep still counted 16 million households using ADSL. A figure that will decline inexorably due to the effect of fiber optic connections. Indeed, the government has set itself the goal of connecting everyone to FttH by 2025.

It was therefore becoming difficult to maintain this aging network, which is energy-intensive and expensive to maintain. With 22.6 million lines still active and 1.1 million cables, 60% of which are in underground trenches, this is a titanic undertaking.

Orange, the historical owner of the copper network, has signed an agreement with Arcep to conduct dismantling tests.

"We chose Lévis Saint Nom to begin with because of its 1,600 inhabitants, its 700 homes and the fact that there are few businesses. This typology is representative of 80% of the communes in France," explains Laurence Thouveny, Director of Orange Île-de-France.

When the "decommissioning" process began in June 2020, there were still 120 copper customers in the commune. Each commercial operator then had to convince its customers to switch to fiber with the guarantee, for those using only the telephone, to have similar tariff offers. Eight subscribers are still clinging to copper, but on March 31, whatever happens, Orange will cut everything.

"There is no technical difficulty with stopping copper. The main issue is to accompany customers and contact them one by one to propose alternative offers," summarizes the technical director and information systems of Orange Marc Blanchet.

The extinction of copper has only just begun and should not be completed before 2030. This long process will be carried out in patches, zone by zone, with extremely long lead times of several years.

Finally, the disappearance of copper does not mean the end of the fixed telephone, which will be able to continue to function via optical fiber, without any obligation to subscribe to an Internet service.

After Lévis Saint Nom, two other cities will be chosen in the coming weeks to continue the experiment.

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Source : 01net

In a press release, af2m (French Association for the Development of Multi-operator Multimedia Services and Uses) "welcomes Iliad's membership, which joins Bouygues Telecom, Orange and SFR among its operator members".

The association has been working to "develop and promote multi-operator B2B2C services while respecting and protecting the end user" for more than 15 years. Among the subjects of concern: segmented advertising, payment solutions on operator invoices, SMS marketing, etc.

For af2m "This membership is an opportunity for all digital players who will be able to offer their professional customers (companies, online service providers, local authorities, associations, etc.) services that are now accessible to all French mobile and Internet users".

This will certainly prepare the launch of the operator's B2B offer: Free Pro. A launch that has been imminent for months... but is finally becoming clearer. As a reminder, Free's parent company is still not a member of the French Telecom Federation.

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Source : Next Inpact

The latest quarterly figures published by Arcep confirm the growth of optical fibre in France: "the fourth quarter of 2020 was marked by record growth in fibre optic deployment (FttH) and its adoption, which concludes another record year in 2020". The 10 million subscriptions to FttH offers have now passed the 10 million mark.

The number of very high-speed broadband subscriptions now stands at 14.7 million. This represents nearly half of the total number of Internet subscriptions in France, and 51% of the number of premises eligible for very high-speed broadband, an increase of 3 points in one year.

This growth is primarily due to the increase in FttH subscriptions. With 3.3 million additional accesses in 2020, the number of FttH subscriptions is estimated at 10.4 million, or 70% of the total number of very high-speed accesses. Although broadband subscriptions still make up the majority of Internet subscriptions, with almost 16 million, they have dropped by 2.5 million in 2020.

In total, at the end of 2020, France had 30.6 million broadband and very high-speed subscriptions. This represents an increase of 285,000 in one quarter and 800,000 in one year (+2.7%). "Such annual growth has not been observed for three years," according to estimates from Arcep.

A trend that owes much to the sustained deployment of end-to-end fiber optic lines by operators and players in the sector. More than 1.9 million additional premises were made connectable to FttH during the fourth quarter of 2020. "More than 5.8 million lines were deployed in 2020, despite the health situation, 19% more than in 2019," said the telecoms policeman.

Now, 24.2 million premises are eligible for FttH offers, an increase of 31% in one year. Most of this growth is located in medium-density areas - the AMII zone (Appel à Manifestation d'Intention d'Investissement). At the end of the fourth quarter of 2020, a total of 28.6 million premises were eligible for very high-speed broadband services, all technologies combined, including 21.7 million outside very dense areas.

While fiber deployment is progressing well, many homes and businesses are complaining about connectivity at half-mast. This is due to faulty maintenance or connections at sharing points, which generate numerous quality-of-service problems.
To remedy this, the operators have just concluded an agreement that could be a milestone in the sector. They are committed to improving the safety and quality of interventions with a new system of penalties.

The agreement, announced by Infranum, also provides for the collective assumption of the costs of restoring the network. This will slow down the explosion of "noodle dishes" overflowing the pooling points, which could eventually pose a major problem for the connectivity of individuals and professionals.

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Source : ZDNet

InfraNum has just announced "a major agreement between operators to improve the quality of connections and guarantee the durability of fiber networks in France". The quality of the operations of connection to the optical fiber is currently under fire, the federation of digital infrastructure manufacturers is trying to reassure. A framework has therefore been put in place and will be set out in numerous agreements between access providers and network operators... some of which have yet to be signed.

For 18 months, infrastructure operators (RO) and commercial operators (CO) have been working together to draw up these new Stoc contracts (for commercial operator subcontracting). The aim is to improve an operating mode that everyone is keen to maintain: the Internet access provider (OC) connects its subscriber, as a subcontractor of the network operator (RO).

Indeed, in the face of the influx of demand, its defenders argue that this is the most efficient way to operate in order to make things happen quickly. But not to do well, retort the detractors of the Stoc mode denouncing degradation, connection failures or access cuts.

The Stoc mode is therefore striving to make its transformation, "to improve the quality and safety of interventions, the processes and speed of connection, and the training of those involved". InfraNum therefore announces that discussions between network operators and ISPs have led to progress in three areas:

• "Improving the safety and quality of interventions", with in particular the "realization of joint audits and the introduction of sanctions that can go as far as the exclusion of a subcontractor in case of contractual failure".
• "Increase transparency" through a system for monitoring interventions and "control by an artificial intelligence system" on the side of the network operator".
• "Rebalancing maintenance costs: between ROs and COs, collective coverage of network restoration costs, according to a distribution key approved by the Arcep".

While the industry federation assures that "the first signatures have already taken place for rapid generalization and immediate implementation," it concedes, however, that this "new contractual framework" has not yet been fully deployed.

For example, network operators Axione and Altitude Infra have signed "with the majority of OCs", while things are "on the right track" for TDF. On the other hand, there is nothing on the progress of discussions with Orange and SFR, which have the particularity of being both commercial operators and network operators, particularly in public and private initiative zones.

A little more patience therefore before this new major agreement is implemented in unison on all networks and between all operators and ISPs. The interest for stakeholders is that it "avoids imposing a regulatory decision". The Arcep is currently conducting a consultation on the subject.

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Source : DegroupTest

The government has just announced a "digital and environmental roadmap" to reduce the carbon footprint of digital technology in France. With several measures, this document is the result of collaboration between the offices of Cédric O, Secretary of State for Digital Technology, and Barbara Pompili, Minister for the Ecological Transition. An aid fund with a budget of 300 million euros is also planned.

Among these measures, telecoms operators will have to encourage customers to bring back their unused mobiles. The goal is to inject them into the reconditioning circuit or direct them to the recycling circuit.

If turning to easily repairable devices (thanks to the repairability index in place since January 1, 2021) or reconditioned devices (from players such as Back Mark, ReCommerce or PRS Solution) is better but not ideal either. Cédric O indicates: "We have entrusted Arcep with a mission to look into the model of smartphones subsidized by telecom operators. This may be a gas pedal for the renewal of telephones and therefore problematic for the environment. We want to delve deeper into this subject and objectify the impact of these commercial practices before taking any decisions on the subject".

The French Secretary of State for Digital Technology is notably thinking about pushing "the leasing of smartphones from operators, as is done in other countries".

For his part, the telecoms gendarme has been asked to create an "environmental barometer of digital players". This will be based on data collected from players such as data center managers, smartphone manufacturers and telecom operators.

The Arcep will also have to take into account the environmental aspect when allocating 5G frequencies. As a result, the allocation criteria could include the energy consumption of the relay antennas, as well as the coverage of the territory.

Not forgetting the giants of the Net, especially popular video platforms such as Neflix. Barbara Pompili explains: "What is the point of broadcasting very high quality video on smartphone screens just a few centimeters wide? We need to avoid aberrant practices such as automatic video playback, for example, which lead to unnecessary energy consumption".

The government will also have to set an example by turning to refurbishment and supporting the industry. "The government must set an example. We would like to see 20% of public orders for telephones or computer equipment to be for reconditioned devices," says Barbara Pompili.

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Source : Univers Freebox

The results published by Orange and Bouygues Telecom confirm the French people's enthusiasm for Very High Speed Internet. Both operators saw their number of FttH subscribers explode in the 4th quarter of 2020 with gains of 9% for the former and 16% for the latter.

The end of the year 2020 has never been so successful for the incumbent operator. With 388,000 additional fiber customers in the last three months of the year, Orange had 4.5 million FttH Internet subscribers. This also enables it to consolidate its number one position on fiber even though its runner-up, Free, has not yet published its results.

Act 2 of the confinement has finally convinced many French people of the need for a very high-speed Internet line to cope with the repetition of this type of situation. In this context, Orange fiber being the most available, with 22.9 million eligible premises at the end of the year, was unsurprisingly in great demand.

Bouygues Telecom remains one notch behind Orange, but also Free, in terms of the number of premises eligible for its FttH offers: 17.7 million at the end of 2020. That's still 6 million more in one year, which, combined with the containment effect and the fact that it is moving further afield, is no stranger to the impressive growth posted by the operator.

Indeed, the Bouygues group's telecom brand has grown from 1 million to 1.6 million fiber optic Internet customers in just one year. This represents a jump of 60%, to which the fourth quarter made a major contribution, with 226,000 FttH subscribers joining the ranks over the period.

In total, nearly 40% of the 4.2 million households that surf at Bouygues have optical fiber, a penetration rate similar to that of Orange and Free. With such a buoyant context for fiber, Iliad's brand should undoubtedly break records in the fourth quarter, and approach the symbolic milestone of 3 million fiber subscribers. Answer during its 2020 review, scheduled for next month.

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Source : DegroupTest

The annual report on the quality of experience of the services offered by mobile operators in mainland France has just been published by the specialized firm Qosi. This document is intended to report on user experience on 2G, 3G and 4G networks marketed by operators during the year 2020.

This study is based on feedback from 42,000 contributors spread across 20,000 municipalities in France. And the results reflect a growing disparity of situations, whether in the countryside or in the city. By 2020, 23% of metropolitan municipalities will have a low-quality 4G network, with the vast majority of flows below 10 Mb/s. Worse still, 3% of the municipalities surveyed do not have any usable data network... 95% of these municipalities are located in rural areas.

Nevertheless, it should be noted that the quality of service of mobile networks is constantly improving, both in the city and in the countryside. In terms of downstream speeds, for example, Orange is one step ahead of its competitors in 2020, with the best average speed at national level. The incumbent operator is followed by SFR, then Bouygues and finally Free.
Despite widespread improvement, this is still not enough to widen the yawning gap that now separates rural and urban connections.

Take the case of Orange. Even by improving its downstream speeds by 10 Mb/s in all geographical areas, this is still not enough to close the gap between the quality of service observed in rural and urban areas. The operator is thus the one with the greatest disparity in speeds between the different strata of the population.

Conversely, Free is progressing uniformly throughout the country, making it the operator offering the most consistent quality of service.

The same applies to upload speeds. Orange has the best average upload speed in France. But the difference in treatment will remain significant depending on whether users are in urban or rural areas. In spite of this, the incumbent operator has established itself as the operator offering the best speeds for all population strata. Next comes Bouygues Telecom, followed by SFR and then Free.

This territorial divide is logically reflected in the results of the quality of service offered by operators on web browsing. At the national level, the proportion of pages displayed in less than 10 seconds is 92% for Orange, 89% for Bouygues Telecom and SFR and 86% for Free. Here again, rural areas are down 5 to 10 points compared to urban areas. This is enough to push operators to redouble their efforts to finally hope to bridge the digital divide in 2021.

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Source : ZDNet