Regulation may hinder Fiber to the Home

Regulatory uncertainty continues to challenge fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) investment globally, as regulators struggle to find a way to encourage competition without discouraging investors or disadvantaging incumbents. While incumbents remain convinced that open access or wholesale models won't enable them to earn a return on their investment, regulators would prefer open access models, said Benoit Felten, senior analyst with Yankee Group. Felten advises regulators to be more decisive, choose a model for regulating next-generation access networks and move on, since regulatory uncertainty is almost guaranteed to slow investment in new networks. At minimum, Felten's advice to governments that don't want to subsidize FTTH deployment -- as the Japanese, South Koreans and Nordics have -- is to make sure the legal environment aids rather than hinders the network rollout and to make sure that laws regarding in-building wiring, dig-sharing or aerial networking don't disadvantage potential new competitors. In low-density rural areas where deployment is most expensive, governments may need to consider funding deployment of FTTH, Felten said.