Fibre: changing behaviour over time
Benoit, how do these findings translate to other markets in Europe and the rest of the world? Which learnings and conclusions may we draw?
“One of the key conclusions is clearly that usage maturity comes with time: we often expect users to make the most of their fibre connection the minute they subscribe, but that’s simply not the case. The other important thing is that the role of TV in broadband packages in a given market does make a big difference. Portugal and France are likely more TV-centric than Sweden, and that explains some of the differences that may last over time.”
In Portugal, and (especially) France the perceived quality of FTTH/B by DSL users is high but not as high as in Sweden. Is that simply due to lack of familiarity?
“In France it’s due to the price of FTTH/B, 25% higher than the price of DSL. That dampens overall satisfaction even though users recognize the higher quality of FTTH/B. In Portugal it’s a little lower than in Sweden but the overall satisfaction profile is the same. Difference probably down to familiarity, yes.”
Public Private Partnerships
In Sweden, differences in user behaviour could be attributed to greater familiarity and experience with Fibre. Can you give some more background on this? As fibre becomes more widely available, is it more or less inevitable that everyone will want to adopt it?
“In all three markets we see a long-term trend towards fiber. Even people who don’t intend to upgrade anytime soon state that if they upgraded, they would massively choose fibre. That’s assuming availability is there, of course. As for user behaviour, the cross-country analysis tends to suggest that fiber does alter behaviour over time, but Portugal and France are too early in the adoption curve still for that to be visible.”
In the 1990s, Sweden’s government took steps to stimulate fibre uptake. What can other governments learn from this? Which approach should they take?
“The main consequence of these steps was to drive the emergence of publicly-owned municipal fibre networks. That’s no longer a reasonable outcome to expect in an age when most of the lucrative business market in most cities has already been ‘fibred’. In our day and age, the policy drive is more towards public private partnerships which would lower the bill for public stakeholders and ensure long-term profits for private investors in infrastructure.”
In France, average spending for FTTH broadband is 49,1€/m vs. 39,1€/m for DSL broadband.
In Portugal 88% of FTTH/B users are very or rather satisfied vs. only 75% of DSL users.
In France 91% of DSL users & 96% of FTTH/B users have a very good or good opinion of broadband over fiber.
In Portugal 81% of FTTH/B users view their solution as much better or better than what they had before.
In France 57% of DSL users say they won’t upgrade their broadband because no better solution is available where they live.
In Portugal 95% of FTTH/B / 85% of DSL users would upgrade to fibre if they upgraded.
In France 29% of FTTH/B users are ‘very satisfied’ with the latency of their broadband vs. only 17% for DSL users.
In Portugal 57% of DSL users find the price of their broadband excessive vs. only 46% of FTTH/B users.
Read the Swedish study here.
