Quickline CEO Sean Royce forecasts the collapse of rural communities as the UK’s fibre coverage targets make hard-to-reach areas an unattractive prospect. Fibre providers continue to be put off by the cost and complexity of taking their rollouts to sparse geographies, instead opting to overbuild others in cities and market towns.
It is a pivotal year for fibre: with large amounts of on-going build activity, altnets vying for space and investment, and a potential wave of regulatory change poised to go ahead – yet the opportunities remain huge. Some of this is not new, and the fibre sector has been anticipating reforms for some time. However, anticipating these challenges and finding ways to thrive alongside them is key.
According to Netgem TV’s MD Sylvain Thevenot the addition of TV packages can boost full fibre sales by up to a quarter, and he is urging altnets to differentiate through bundling ‘Fibre with TV’ as the race for connections heats up.
With full fibre success stories in full flow it is easy to forget that the sector is impacted by the same tempestuous economic conditions as the rest of the UK.
Altnets and OTT providers will find greater success in working together as the investor landscape shifts and customers look for reasons to change providers.
Flomatik CEO Dean Checkley confesses that 2021 was a tough year for the business, a feeling shared by many, but with a new target operating model for 2022, he states the business is now ready to move from surviving, to thriving.
The UK’s fibre rollout is driving innovation, but the reverse is also true and innovative fibre providers will gain the edge in a saturated market.
According to Ofcom estimates, Altnet fibre deployment exceeded the Openreach build machine for the first time this January, but ‘overbuild’ without customer uptake could threaten further fibre expansion.
The demand for skilled workers continues to grow as altnets scale up their operations, but the limited labour market means attracting and retaining talent has become an industry wide issue.