MTN fibre-to-the-home has arrived

MTN South Africa says it has connected the first customers to its fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) offering.

The operator first announced its intentions to launch the service in April, following successful FTTH trials conducted with residents of Monaghan Farm, a gated estate located 30km north of Johannesburg.

The group had hoped to commercially launch a 100Mbps FTTH service in South Africa by 1 June 2014, but missed the launch date, stating only that the offering would launch within “a few weeks”.

“The rollout of FTTH in Monaghan Farm is progressing well, with 75% of the homes already connected and enjoying the benefits of this high-speed network, the remaining homesteads will be connected in the next two weeks,” said Eben Albertyn, CTO at MTN SA.

He said that commercial agreements with the home owners association have been concluded.

Monaghan Farm’s Chandre Buys told MyBroadband in April, that between 60% and 80% of the estates’ 50 residents signed up for the MTN FTTH service.

MTN pointed out that its FTTH roll-out is demand-driven, adding that advanced discussions were underway with several other residential sites.

“Discussions are progressing positively with other areas that have shown interest,” Albertyn said, adding that interested parties and members of the public are encouraged to work with their home owners associations.

In May, residents of Joburg suburb, Parkhurst, put out a request for proposal for FTTH vendors to install a fibre network in their neighbourhood.

The Parkhurst Residents and Business Owners Association (PRABOA) said earlier this month that it nominated Vumatel as its preferred provider, following 16 proposals from firms including MTN, Vodacom, Telkom, and Dark Fibre Africa.

MTN fibre pricing in Monaghan Farm

MTN said that its FTTH offers in Monaghan Farm vary based on desired internet speed – ranging from 10Mbps to 100Mbps.

The operator said that pricing is currently only available to residents, and is negotiated on a case-by-case basis, dependent on the amount of infrastructure and civil engineering required for each estate.

And while not confirmed by MTN, MyBroadband reported that MTN’s FTTH customers in Monaghan Farm will have to pay three monthly fees to be connected – an access fee, a line speed fee and a data charge.

The following table provides an overview of the total cost of an FTTH service from MTN in Monaghan Farm.

It should be noted that these prices are not official, and MTN refused to confirm whether the prices are accurate or not.

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