Hyperactive French alternative operator Iliad Group – which trades variously as Free, Onetel, Iliad Telecom, Kertel and IFW - has increased its fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) firepower with the purchase of Citiefibre. What Iliad/Free gets for an undisclosed sum is a Paris-based operator with over 3,000km of fibre network, 500 clients, and 300 buildings passed by optical fibre (representing some 4,000 households that can be connected to the network). Citefibre also owns authorisations allowing it to connect another 4,000 households in the French capital.

Iliad says the two operators will now carry out a joint project to roll out an optical fibre network in Paris. In September Free announced its own plans to roll out by 2012 FTTH infrastructure covering 10mn users, serviceable via more than 4mn connection points, and offering 50Mbits/s access (click). The same month the company awarded a fibre contract to Draka Comteg to cover 2.1mn people in the Parisian, first phase of its FTTH network.

Rival France Télécom’s own approach to FTTH seems to be somewhat more ambiguous. In January the French incumbent announced that, before the summer of 2006, it would be testing a FTTH offering in six districts in Paris and six cities in the Hauts-de-Seine. Reportedly France Télécom had connected 100 homes by mid-year. Again, delivering a keynote at the ‘Broadband World Forum’ conference in Paris earlier this month French Industry Minister Francois Loos reportedly called for service providers to hook up 4mn homes with FTTH by 2012, and the response of France Télécom chairman and ceo Didier Lombard was, apparently, to the effect of ‘we will do better than that.’

However, an analysis posted last week by Ovum principal analyst Michael Philpott and citing Lombard speaking at an unnamed European conference that took place in that week, made the following observation: “…it was confirmed this week by the ceo of France Télécom, Didier Lombard, that no further commitment has yet been made to a greater deployment, stating ‘we will do it [FTTH deployment] when we have content’.”
John Williamson