French regulator Arcep has published an updated scorecard measuring the progress made in the white-spots programme (called “zones blanches - centres-bourgs”) addressing the lack of mobile services in rural France. One of the main objectives of the programme is to provide mobile broadband coverage to 100 percent of the participating municipalities by end-June 2017. For these municipalities (accounting for approximately 1 percent of the national population), the proportion covered by 3G mobile broadband services has improved significantly to 75 percent as of January, compared to 57 percent in October 2016.
The other key objective of the programme, however, has yet to be met. Mobile operators aimed to provide at least basic voice and SMS services to 100 percent of the participating municipalities by the end of 2016, but coverage stood at 92 percent in January (up from 91 percent in October 2016). As noted by the regulator in previous reports, most of the municipalities without any coverage are still waiting for public authorities to install a tower.
Arcep's scorecard also measures progress with the deployment of LTE services in sparsely populated areas, set as part of the coverage obligations attached to the 800 MHz mobile licences held by Orange, Bouygues Telecom and SFR. These areas contain 22,500 rural municipalities representing 18 percent of the country's population and 63 percent of its land mass. Orange, Bouygues Telecom and SFR were each required to reach 40 percent of the population in these areas by 17 January. All three had exceeded their target by this date, covering 54, 52 and 50 percent of the population respectively.