DSL Dazzle
Niraj K Gupta
Saturday,
August 17, 2002
Subscriber numbers have gone up across
APAC; it’s time to offer broadband content and services.
DSL was hyped to convert the copper wires into gold
ones. Many, however, started to believe that DSL technology promised a great
deal, but is yet to deliver.
Leaving aside the usual hype factor, the reality
is that not only DSL technology has proven itself by making market inroads in
many Asian markets, it has led to growth in bandwidth available to households
around the world. Asia is now the largest DSL market in the world with about
8.4 million DSL users at the end of 2001. Korea stands tall by accounting for 7
million of this total with low consumer prices taking the broadband penetration
to a quarter of the country’s households. This speaks of Korean commitment to
bring broadband connectivity to its population. Similar growth can be seen in
Taiwan, Australia, Hong Kong, Japan and Singapore. Malaysia and Thailand are
also seeing growth in DSL subscribers. The Yankee Group has predicted an
average compound growth rate of 28 percent in the years 2000-2005. Even in
Europe, ADSL subscriber numbers have exploded recently with Belgium doubling in
the last three months of 2001, France going from 200,000 at the end of
September to 430,000 by the end of the year and Germany having a total of 1.8
million customers, according to Ovum.
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Technical Standards
So far G.lite, the simpler and cheaper
version of ADSL, has been very popular. After G.lite are coming the two new
members of the DSL family of standards—G.dmt and G.shdsl. The G.shdsl
standard—approved in February 2001—is being rolled out in certain parts of the
world, mainly as a business solution. Symmetric DSL (SDSL) may eventually be
standardized on G.shdsl, but it is yet to gain popularity with carriers
evaluating the market potential and the value that it brings to the market.
SingTel’s DSL network, now mainly based on G.dmt, also supports G.lite.
However, for most carriers, reducing operational
expenses, provisioning costs, etc. have been the key issues being addressed by
automating the service provisioning process.
Value-added Services
For managing quality of service and
bandwidth costs, one needs to deliver both IP and non-IP services over DSL
(including video). This needs to utilize network intelligence in the central
office. Besides home networking and gaming as options, investments in voice-over-DSL
can bring additional revenue streams and savings to new providers over the
conventional analog voice.
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Value-added services are key to making broadband
profitable. Besides high-end services like video-over-DSL
(VoDS L), there can be simpler ones like gaming, home networking
support, security-firewall, virus protection, and others to bring in additional
revenues.
Using the broadband infrastructure, carriers can
increase the average monthly revenue per customer. Adding services makes for
more customer ‘touch point’, and value-added services layered on top of the
embedded technology bring the long-term stickiness of the product besides
revenues. The cable companies demonstrated considerably lower churn for the
customers who used voice, data and video services over the ones using plain
vanilla services.
With very high-speed DSL (VDSL) providing both
asymmetrical access (up to 26 Mbps downstream and 3 Mbps upstream) and
symmetrical access (up to 14 Mbps in both directions), lots of interactivity
and content can be delivered to subscribers. This gives carriers the ability to
bundle even more services. Video provisioning is poised to be the
differentiating factor for telcos in future.
Shall we join the race to bridge the emerging
broadband divide?
By Niraj K. Gupta, "from my cell",
Voice & Data, August 2002