The Irish government has appointed a preferred bidder for the National Broadband Plan (NBP), which aims to bring high-speed broadband to 1.1 million people across rural Ireland. The long-awaited decision follows several years of discussion and all but one candidate withdrawing from the tender.
Granahan McCourt has established a new Irish registered company called National Broadband Ireland (NBI) to build, operate and maintain the network. The total cost to the state will be EUR 3 billion over 25 years, including EUR 545 million for conditional and contingent subsidy, and EUR 354 million in VAT which will be paid to the Revenue Commissioners as subsidy is spent.
The contract includes a wide range of protections and legally binding obligations, including a set of key performance indicators to ensure service is maintained appropriately. No subsidy will be paid to the NBP company until the milestones have been achieved.
The appointed bidder is setting up a wholesale open access company to roll out the mainly FTTP network in the designated areas. This will initially provide broadband services of 150 Mbps to the majority of households, and up to 1 Gbps for heavy data users and SMEs. Consumer broadband will be upgraded to 300 Mbps by year 6 and 600 Mbps by year 10. Business products will be upgraded to 2 Gbps by year 11 and incrementally after that. The network infrastructure will re-use existing poles and ducts as much as possible, which NBI will lease from existing infrastructure owners.
Roll-out of the network will start in Q4, with most of the targeted premises passed within the initial five years and the overall roll-out completed within 7 years. The NBP will benefit around 540,000 premises (including 56,000 farms and 44,000 non-farm businesses), 1.1 million people (23% of the population) and 674 schools.
Regulator ComReg welcomed the government's decision to appoint a preferred bidder for the provision of high-speed broadband in rural areas. ComReg said it would support oversight of the programme by advising the Department of Communications.