Thursday, December 14th, 2017 (5:25 pm) - Score 2,847

The Scottish Government has today confirmed that it plans to spend £600 million on gap funding for their R100 programme, which aims to make a superfast broadband (30Mbps+) capable network available to 100% of Scotland by the end of 2021 (March 2022 when viewing as a financial year).

At present around 92-93% of premises (homes and businesses) can already access a 30Mbps+ capable connection and this should rise to 95% by the end of March 2018. The effort so far has been largely supported by the existing £428m Digital Scotland (DSSB) project with BT (Openreach), which is busy rolling out a mix of their ‘up to’ 80Mbps FTTC and 330Mbps FTTP to various parts of the country (not to mention separate commercial deployments from the same operator and others like Virgin Media etc.).

However we should point out that the current target drops to just 86% for the rural Highland and Islands region by the end of 2017 (here). Overall some 800,000 additional premises have already been covered by the existing project, which has included the installation of a 400km long sub-sea and 30,000km land based fibre optic network.

Sadly this still leaves around 280,000+ premises left to serve, many of which exist in some of the toughest, most sparse and thus most expensive areas to reach, and that’s where the R100 programme comes into play. This also explains why it will cost significantly more to reach the final few percent of premises than it did to deliver the first c.800,000.

Fergus Ewing, Rural Economy and Connectivity Secretary, said: “This is the biggest public investment ever made in a UK broadband project. It is a truly transformative moment for our broadband infrastructure and a statement of our intent to make Scotland a world-class digital nation. Fast and reliable internet connection is vital for the economic and social wellbeing of all communities. This ambitious investment – which is more than three times what the UK Government is putting towards their own fibre broadband rollout – will revitalise the prospects of rural areas right across Scotland. Building on the success of the Digital Scotland programme, we will deliver a future-proofed, national fibre network that will place rural Scotland among the best connected places anywhere in Europe. I am confident that the scale of our investment, and of our ambition, will attract interest from a wide range of telecoms suppliers across the UK and Europe.”

The new investment forms part of the Scottish Government’s 2018-19 draft budget, which doesn’t actually give us any clear indication of where all the money will be coming from, although we note that £20.99m is still outstanding from BDUK Phase 2 and is thus likely to form part of the R100 pot.

The document also notes that the current Digital Scotland roll-out is expected to continue during 2018-19 and will reach more premises than originally planned, which is to be funded through gainshare (clawback) that requires BT to return part of the public investment as take-up rises above 20% (more is returned as this increases over the 7 year lifespan of the contract). This should complement R100’s work.

An initial procurement for the R100 programme is expected to formally begin by the end of December 2017 and this will then last for approximately one year, which is understandable given the complicated and challenging terrain that operators will need to consider as part of their surveys.

The gap-funding approach once again envisages an outcome where the Scottish Government’s investment will be matched by money from other public sources (e.g. councils) and the private sector. Interestingly the official line is that they will aim to “find suppliers who will connect as many premises as possible for the available subsidy,” which means that the 100% target is not yet set in stone until the potential supplier(s) have confirmed they can actually deliver it.

A lot of supplier engagement was undertaken during 2017 and this is said to have “concluded that a single procurement for R100, containing three regional lots, will give the best chance of maximising competition and attracting the widest possible range of bids.”

Mark Collins, Cityfibre’s Director of Strategy and Public Affairs, said: “It is great to see Holyrood investing in superfast infrastructure to ensure nobody is left behind as the digital age takes hold. However, as today’s announcement about Aberdeen City Council shows, towns and cities across the country are already working with alternatives infrastructure builders like CityFibre to deliver even faster and more reliable full-fibre connectivity. We look forward to learning more about this funding from the Scottish Government and understanding what it will deliver in terms of helping Scotland maximise its clear potential as a digital leader.”

Brendan Dick, BT Scotland Director, said: “We have been open about our wish to participate in the R100 process and look forward to seeing the detail of the tenders.”

We think it is possible to reach 100% by 2021 with the available investment but there are a lot of uncertain factors to consider, not least with respect to technology choice (e.g. how much of a role will deeply inferior Satellite play?) and regulation flexibility. Nevertheless the Scottish Government should be commended for actually setting a solid target for universal coverage of 30Mbps+ broadband.

Nearly every other EU country except the UK has pledged to do something similar, although Wales is already working to try and find some suppliers who can beat Scotland’s ambition (here). We can only hope that little old England will find its way to deliver something better than just the 10Mbps+ USO.

NOTE: The statement claiming “this is the biggest public investment ever made in a UK broadband project” isn’t entirely correct because the national Broadband Delivery UK programme originally committed £530m to its first phase and £250m to its second phase (total of £830m), although quite a bit of that went on admin, lawyers, pilots, advertising and various other things before the deployment itself. On top of that local bodies (e.g. councils) have contributed around £903m in total contracted match funding.