Spain is the European country with the highest fibre to the home (FTTH) penetration rate in Europe, with 33.9%, after clocking up around 1.61 million new subscrbers between September 2016 and September 2017, according to a report requested by the European Council of FTTH, made up of 150 companies.
The document, presented during the FTTH Conference 2018 celebrated this week in Valencia, highlights that Spain had about 17.5 million homes with fibre and around 6 million subscribers at the end of September.
This makes it the European country with the most optical fibre to the home (FTTH) of the 39 countries analysed in the report. That said, if the level of FTTH is added to the level of fibre to the business (FTTB), Spain is in eighth place after Latvia, Sweden, Lithuania, Russia, Belarus, Iceland and Romania.
With regard to the situation in Europe as a whole, the report prepared by Idate shows that the number of subscriptions for FTTH and FTTB rose 20.4% to over 51,6 million between September 2016 and September 2017. It particularly flags the “significant increase” in new subscribers in Russia, almost 1,83 million between September 2016 and September 2017, as well as the considerable increases in Spain (1.612.371) and France (1.067.780).
The number of houses with fibre optic, both FTTH and FTTB, in the 39 European countries has rose “considerably” to over 149 million at end-September 2017, 16% higher than a year earlier. At the same time, the report provides other figures like the fact that 56% of the actors who roll out the network are private operators, both former incumbents as well as alternatives. So there are more of them than there are public or energy companies.
Whatsmore, it highlights the greater relevance of FTTH compared with FTTB (55% vs 45% in September 2017). Also the fact that in countries like France and Spain between two and three operators reach the same house with their networks, which indicates that more and more actors are investing in creating their own networks.
* Photo: Flickr / Gary H
