Broadband group disputes Ireland’s broadband household penetration claims

13 Sep 2013

Broadband lobby group IrelandOffline has disputed the claim by Ireland’s Commission for Communications Regulation (ComReg) yesterday that Irish households have 65pc broadband penetration, arguing that the real figure is 24.4pc.

Yesterday, ComReg published its quarterly report for the second quarter of 2013 announcing that the household broadband penetration rate at the end of the second quarter in Ireland stood at 65pc. The mobile market now accounts for almost 74pc of all voice and internet subscriptions.

According to ComReg, average fixed broadband speeds continue to increase. In Q2, about 37.5pc of all fixed broadband subscriptions were equal to or greater than 10Mbps, up from 30.1pc since Q2 2012. Some 29.9pc of all fixed broadband subscriptions were equal to or greater than 30Mbps, up from 19.6pc in Q2 2012.

However, IrelandOffline disputes the claim that 65pc of the population has broadband, citing official OECD figures.

“A headline rate of 65pc household broadband penetration would put us way, way above countries with proper infrastructure, like Korea or Switzerland. Plainly, this is fantastical,” said IrelandOffline chairman Eamon Wallace.

“The fixed broadband per capita penetration rate was given as 24.4pc in Q2 2013,” he said pointing to OECD figures.

“These figures are based on a population base of 4,598,600 from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) data. The CSO actually stated that we had a population of 4,593,100 in April 2013.

“ComReg also notes the broadband per capita penetration rate (including mobile broadband) was 36.2pc.and yet the household penetration is 65pc. .This implies that 24.4pc of internet is fixed and 40.1pc is mobile if we are to arrive at 65pc (allowing 1pc for dial-up and satellite internet connections we will reduce that to 39pc).

Wallace said ComReg is now entering the third year since its started its broadband speed measurement programme and said the data has yet to be published.

He called on ComReg to confirm if the programme is active and to produce the data.

John Kennedy is a journalist who served as editor of Silicon Republic for 17 years

editorial@siliconrepublic.com