Avoid fibre optic duplicating says industry
Industry leaders have called for government to stop duplicating open fibre networks where that infrastructure already exists.
This is the general consensus of the panel discussion of industry leaders who gathered to discuss the future of fibre in South Africa, at an event held to showcase the potential of optic fibre and its role in businesses.
Internet speeds of up to 500Mbps were showcased by Internet Solutions at the event.
Companies represented by the panel included Conduct Telecoms, Dark Fibre Africa (DFA), Vodacom, Internet Solutions (IS), Teraco and Jasco ICT Solutions.
Industry leads said that government should work with the private sector to stimulate delivery of services and drive demand for fibre.
“Private sector and Government need to work much closer together to create a framework which deploys complementary, rather than isolated and often overlapping and competing fibre deployments in the same areas whilst omitting other un-serviced areas,” said Jasco ICT solutions general manger for business development, Eckart Zollner.
According to IS connectivity executive, Sean Nourse, industry also needs to look beyond the fibre infrastructure.
“The industry needs to step forward and look at how to encourage services around fibre and the enhanced services it allows,” he said.
“Bandwidth costs have decreased significantly and it will continue to come down, now we need to look at the consumption of bandwidth and how it can be leveraged across all industries.”
Other challenges facing the effective rollout of fibre to businesses are having access to buildings, and finding solutions to keep up with the growing demand for fibre.
The industry leaders highlighted the importance of infrastructure sharing, and avoiding costly duplication, as a solution to these problems.
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