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Superfast Broadband - Who Needs It?

by Nick Insley | May 26, 2010
Tags: Communications Technology ICT developments

BT has announced that it will expand its roll-out of next-generation broadband to bring super-fast internet services to two-thirds of the UK. Under the new plans it will invest £2.5bn on its new fibre-network which will reach around two thirds of the UK population by 2015.

About a quarter of those on the network will be able to have download speeds of 100 megabits per second (Mbps) and uploads of 30 Mbps while the remainder will be able to get downloads of up to 40 Mbps.

Unless you are connected using Virgin Media’s cable, typical advertised broadband download speeds are currently 'up to' 8 Mbps, but often much less. So the new network will provide a great increase in speed.

But what is the business case behind this massive amount of investment? Or, to put it another way, what are the new services that need more bandwidth than current broadband can provide and will people pay more for them?

The growth in use of on-demand video is currently the major driver of demand for household broadband capacity. Most other applications require far less capacity. So the rate at which people start viewing good quality video over the internet, rather than via a TV aerial, satellite dish of cable network, is what will drive the overall traffic on the network.

However it won’t justify investing in super-fast broadband networks. Based on network speed research, over 80% of homes can already receive a standard definition video stream at 2Mbps (even allowing for 1Mbps of 'additional' broadband traffic to the home). And nearly 50% of the population should be able to receive high definition video using current infrastructure. So, for most forecast usage, the current network will be adequate.

Does BT really know what the new services and revenues are going to be or does it believe the new capability will stimulate as yet undreamt of applications?

My hunch is that there is a limit to the rate at which human brain can absorb information and that current networks, that can provide a good quality on demand video signal, will meet a large proportion of the requirement for a few years yet.

However, we humans are not the only users of services over the Internet. Increasingly wired homes with intelligent appliances will share increasing volumes of data.

Perhaps it is a case of 'build it and they will come', it is just that 'they' are not human.

george.spencer@wcrs.com

George Spencer | Jun 01, 2010

"However it won’t justify investing in super-fast broadband networks. Based on network speed research, over 80% of homes can already receive a standard definition video stream at 2Mbps (even allowing for 1Mbps of 'additional' broadband traffic to the home). And nearly 50% of the population should be able to receive high definition video using current infrastructure. So, for most forecast usage, the current network will be adequate."

It's a long-term move. The demands on your average home broadband connection are now greater than they were in 2001 -- you've not only got multiple avenues of usage (downloading "stuff", streaming movies and tv shows, browsing, gaming, chatting, webcam, etc) but increasingly there are more and more capable devices being used in the home (iPad, iPhone, etc.) So people are using more *more*, if you see what I mean.

That and the sudden uptick in streaming services as a whole. It's not just iPlayer; there's that streaming video games platform too (can't recall the name) and whilst Spotify might not be the answer it's pretty clear that we'll eventually move to a subscription model for music too. Everything in the cloud, streaming to all our devices.

All of this has happened in the past three or four years. When hardware catches up and we're using HD (or even 3D?) displays, bandwidth usage will jump again.

I agree that this won't make us any more efficient. It's just going to make us better procrastinators. But I think it's slightly narrow-minded to argue against plans to upgrade our communication channels in the long-term and very much *for* the long-term by citing usage stats from the present. Smacks a bit of "There is a world market for maybe 4 computers".

Superfast broadband demand

Huw Williams | Jun 01, 2010

Like Nick I used to be very sceptical about the need for superfast broadband - I even used to be sceptical about 2Mb/s. It's true that most of the much vaunted public services stuff can be done at much slower speeds, and that it is video that will drive things. So I became convinced when I heard about TV sets with internet access built in (Panasonic have already launched one). Then it becomes obvious that people will want their normal TV, iPlayer, 4OD etc, YouTube etc etc directly on the TV set - in HD as that becomes normal. Add in other household members doing stuiff on other screens and 40Mb/s disappears quite quickly - even before the fridge starts re-ordering milk.

Speed is nothing

Matt Bee | Jun 10, 2010

Another problem with internet speed is not the size of the pipes or the superfast broadband, it is latency. Shoddy routers, modems and the slow digital handshakes are a major problem and not likely to be resolved soon, it can take longer for your modem to work out what to do with data from a server on the other side of the world than it takes for that data to travel 5,000 miles.