Good News for Openreach “Fibre Broadband” ISPs – Cheaper Cablelinks

Internet service providers that make use of Openreach’s network in the United Kingdom will be pleased to learn that the operator has dropped the price of their 1Gbps and 10Gbps Cablelink services, which are often used to support “fibre broadband” services like FTTC (G.fast or VDSL2) and FTTP.

Not so long ago ISPs could only purchase 1 Gigabit per second capable Cablelinks (GEA – Generic Ethernet Access) to support their network connectivity, which was fine for the older generation of ‘up to’ 40-80Mbps FTTC (VDSL2) broadband services but would have struggled with the new era of 330Mbps G.fast and the growth of FTTP. Luckily a 10Gbps Cablelink has already been introduced to tackle that.

The good news for providers is that the cost of both Openreach’s 1Gbps and 10Gbps GEA Cablelinks will be reduced from 6th October 2017, which is just in time for the first residential G.fast packages to surface on the market.

Openreach Statement

We’re pleased to announce the following price reductions to GEA Cablelink charges effective from 6 October 2017:

* 1 Gigabit GEA Cablelink connection charges reduced from £2,000 to £790
* 10 Gigabit GEA Cablelink connection charges reduced from £10,000 to £1,800

These price reductions are a result of a change in cost recovery approach. The GEA Cablelink product and price at present are uniform across all GEA products (GEA-FTTC, GEA-FTTP and G.Fast), however as our Ultrafast products (GEA-FTTP and G.Fast) evolve this may change in the future.

It’s worth remembering that separate links are usually needed to supply different customers (i.e. VDSL2 or FTTP), but today’s price drop is still likely to have a positive impact on ISPs and that may indirectly benefit consumers.