eircom to invest over €100m in fibre rollout

Irish operator Eircom Group has announced that it plans to “significantly” upgrade Ireland’s telecoms infrastructure by rolling out fibre-based access technologies across the country, before launching IPTV over the new infrastructure in mid-2012.

The company is aiming to serve 100,000 premises with the new network by summer 2012, with the eventual aim of delivering fibre-based services to one million homes and businesses across Ireland.

The project involves initial investments of €100mn and will see eircom upgrade its existing copper access network with Fibre-to-the-Home (FTTH) and Fibre-to-the-Cabinet (FTTC).

eircom plans to make the new network available on a wholesale basis to other ISPs, and specific broadband speeds will vary depending on the technology used: FTTC is expected to support speeds of up to 40 Mbps and beyond, while FTTH is expected to support speeds of up to 150 Mbps.

The telco intends to launch a range of new entertainment services over fibre next year, including IPTV (both live and on-demand), catch-up TV, and social media delivered to the TV.

Paul Donovan, CEO of eircom Group, commented: “Our investment of over €100m underlines the company’s commitment to be the nation’s network provider of choice and to support economic growth in Ireland. The introduction of television and entertainment services is extremely exciting and underlines how far the company has progressed during the past two years.”