Openreach Target Equinox 2 FTTP Broadband Discounts for April 2023
Credible sources have confirmed that Openreach this week issued draft contracts for their forthcoming “Equinox 2” offer to UK broadband ISPs, which will further discount the prices of their gigabit-capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) product and explains why Cityfibre chose yesterday to launch their competition complaint (here).
The draft notice suggests that Openreach’s plan is to formally notify the agreed discounts to industry and Ofcom during the week commencing Monday 12th December 2022. The regulator will then have 90 days to review the offer and, assuming no obstacles, Openreach is targeting implementation for 1st April 2023.
At the time of writing, we haven’t seen the full contract details of the Equinox 2 offer itself, and without that it can be a little difficult to express what it will contain with full confidence (risk of misinterpretation). But broadly speaking, Equinix 2 appears to directly build on top of Equinox 1’s approach, albeit with noticeably cheaper connection charges for some homes and lower monthly rentals on their various FTTP tiers.
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However, the changes to monthly rentals do NOT look to be as significant as they were for Equinox 1, and are more in the order of saving a few tens of pennies per month than pounds. Put another way, those expecting Equinox 2 to be as dramatic a change as Equinox 1 may be disappointed. But as we say, it’s difficult to be certain until the full and final details are released to the public.
The key thing here is that Openreach issued the draft contracts just before Cityfibre responded with their competition complaint, which could potentially change (delay) Openreach’s plan above. We have asked whether Openreach still intend to unveil Equinox 2 next week and await their response.
UPDATE 10:30am
Openreach say they still expect to notify of Equinox 2 before the end of December (i.e. “the CityFibre action doesn’t affect any of our commercial plans“).
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Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook, BlueSky, Threads.net and Linkedin.
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Well, I guess Cityfibre will be happy if Equinox 2 is pennies as opposed tae pounds. Sucks for folk who only have Openreach, however.
I suspect this is more than just a price cut; The whole idea behind these offers, are to encourage CP’s to migrate their customers onto FTTP, as soon as it becomes available in the rollout areas. CityFibre have probably seen the new proposal, soon after it landed with various ISP’s and didn’t like the potential impact from the offer, which I believe has been described as creative.
The problem for CityFibre, in my opinion, is proving that BT/Openreach are being anti-competitive, and arguing that BT/Openreach’s primary motivation isn’t just ensuring the stability of its own business model, which is to retire copper assets and move completely to a PON/cloud architecture. Since BT are completely renewing their access network from scratch, with a £15 Billion investment, it’s in BT/Openreach’s financial interest to retire their copper assets and proceed with their exchange closure program asap. BT/Openreach can’t afford to have CP’s customers sitting on FTTC once areas are fibred out, so they’re encouraging the CP’s to move the customers asap, is that anti-competitive, or just good business?
If BT/Openreach can present a good business case for the Equinox offerings, I don’t see much the regulators can do about it and if Equinox 2 does get blocked it’ll likely be BT taking the regulator to court. It’s my guess Equinox 2 has been well thought out from a regulatory perspective, with a good business case backing it up.
It must be tiresome being so obessessed with a faceless company.
OR must not be prevented from being competitive, while they do have plenty of areas to themselves that no Altnet will ever serve they do have to compete in towns and cities.
Those of us with no choice will benefit from this of course, it’s slightly galling to see an altnet like Ciyfibre arguing against competition in urban areas when they’ve no interest in so many areas.
Just wait a bit and virgin will jump on that bandwagon moaning about all sorts of nonsense, and competition horsepoo… but ultimately it’s all about their profits and shareholders, mostly foreign folk taking money out of the country and system… just look at all the other privatised sectors like utilities and us poor citizens getting shafted in all sorts of ways.
They’re heartless, with everything going on including food prices, these greedy corporations are saying don’t lower the price even if you can, keep milking until there’s nothing left, not when you think it’s enough. Pure evil.
John.
Try to work on your self-esteem. Maybe set some goals, go to college and get some qualifications to improve your situation. Everyone else had to, even me. Then you wouldnt have a victim mentality and realise you are in control of your own life. Nobody is going to help you – you have to do it yourself.
Cityfibre can’t complain. Toob are now selling on their network for £25 for a gig. They can’t have their cake and eat it. It’s embarrassing really. Guess they’ve been so desperate to get connections that they will let anyone sell at stupid prices.