Europe on its way towards a Gigabit society? Not without fibre!

Unter dem Motto „Europe on its way towards a Gigabit Society? Not without Fibre!“ diskutierten hochrangige Teilnehmer aus Politik, Industrie und Telekommunikationsbranche über die Notwendigkeit flächendeckend verfügbarer Glasfasernetze als Basis für eine moderne und nachhaltige Digital-wirtschaft sowie die künftige europäische Gigabit-Gesellschaft und 5G.

Die klare Erkenntnis der hochrangigen Diskussionsrunde mit BREKO-Präsident Norbert Westfal, der hessischen Digitalministerin Kristina Sinemus, Siemens-Vizepräsident Dieter Wegener, dem Direktor für elektronische Kommunikationsnetze und -Dienste bei der EU-Kommission, Anthony Whelan, sowie Antonio Arcidiacono, Direktor bei der European Broadcasting Union (EBU): Damit der Weg zur europäischen Gigabit-Gesellschaft samt florierender Digitalwirtschaft gelingt, braucht es reine Glasfaser als zukunftssichere, nachhaltige digitale Basis-Infrastruktur überall in ganz Europa.

Auch die ambitionierten Ziele, die mit der Einführung des künftigen Mobilfunkstandards 5G verknüpft sind, werden sich nur mit flächendeckend verfügbarer Glasfaser erreichen lassen. Hier braucht es einen synergetischen Rollout zukunftssicherer Glasfaser und von 5G.

Germany’s leading fibre association, the German Broadband Association (BREKO), discussed the decisive role of fibre networks for a modern and sustainable digital economy and as key pillar of the European Gigabit society with high-ranking participants from European and national politics, network providers and the electronic industries. The event, moderated by media platform Euractiv’s editor covering policy in digital affairs, Samuel Stolton, was organized in cooperation with the Association of European Journalists (AEJ) in Belgium and was attended by numerous journalists covering (EU-) politics and the ICT industry. It took place yesterday evening at the Press Club Brussels Europe – right in the heart of Brussel’s European district – and achieved a great resonance.

“Europe on its way towards a Gigabit society? Not without fibre!” – this was not only the title of BREKO’s event, but it remains one of the key statements of Germany’s leading fibre association. Norbert Westfal, BREKO’s president and CEO of EWE TEL, one of Germany’s biggest regional network providers, underlined that a Europe-wide rollout of fibre networks at least to all buildings (Fibre to the building – FTTB or Fibre to the home – FTTH) is essential for the flourishing development of the digital economy and society.

Fibre networks enable both technological innovations and intelligent future solutions and services e.g. in the fields of health, energy and mobility. Moreover, fibre networks will be an essential element across Europe for a successful deployment of the future mobile generation 5G. Without fibre connections to all mobile sites, ultrahigh bandwidths and ultralow reaction times (“latency times”) cannot be achieved.

“Europe’s previous broadband targets (100 MBit/s for all Europeans by 2025) will be outdated by reality soon”, Norbert Westfal stated. “That’s the reason we have to implement a clear infrastructure target: Europe needs future-proof fibre in every building.” When implementing the European Electronic Communications Code into national law, there is “no alternative to establishing an ambitious full-fibre-infrastructure-goal in all 28 member states”, Westfal emphasized.

Dieter Wegener, Chair “Industrie 4.0” – Germany’s Electrical Industry (ZVEI) and Vice-President at Siemens, backed Westfal’s position emphatically. “Without any reasonable doubt, the upcoming digital industry will need highly reliable, ultrafast nearly-real-time broadband connections. These parameters can only be achieved by full fibre networks that will furthermore enable us to establish machine-to-machine-(M2M)-solutions and the connection of whole industry sites with 5G.”

Anthony Whelan, European Commission’s director for Electronic Communications Networks and Services, explained what the regulators can do to encourage roll-out of very high capacity (VHC) networks. He stressed that the objective of the European Electronic Communications Code (EECC) that entered into force at the end of 2018 is to increase investments in and take-up of very high capacity networks and, at the same time, to preserve competition in the market.