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In Ireland, the roll-out of DSL has been dogged by regulatory and cost problems. An Eircom spokesperson told ElectricNews.Net in March, 2001, that it was "on track" to begin offering the service within a month. However, it now appears as if the roll-out will begin in the Autumn on a "phased basis."
Speaking on Friday, an Eircom spokesperson told ElectricNews.Net that high-speed access over DSL will be available from September in Ireland. The spokesperson declined to give details on how long it would take to roll-out the service nationwide and said that no details were available at the moment on its pricing structure. She added that the product would be suited to businesses, big and small, and heavy users residentially.
Digital Subscriber Lines (DSL) allow for high-speed Internet access, as well as "always on" connectivity. The technology has proven popular in other parts of the world, most notably the US and Korea, where combined subscriber numbers are over four million with that figure expected to double over this year.
However, adoption of such broadband access in Europe has been slow and only 10 million households are expected to have a high-speed connection by 2003.
It is expected that the DSL services in Ireland will lead to the introduction of other high-speed broadband services, including video and music on demand, sometime after the service is launched.
The roll-out of DSL in Ireland comes after Eircom was confronted with an ODTR decision in May issuing price directives for local loop unbundling. Under the terms of the directive, monthly line rental has been fixed at EUR13.53, which is within the EU range of EUR8.23 to EUR19.51. Eircom had originally proposed a monthly rental of EUR32.50.
The directive has also fixed connection charges at EUR119.73, which compares with the EU range of EUR47 to EUR221.69.
The spokesperson for Eircom said that other Irish operators had been invited to work with Eircom on trial services this summer, however it was unclear whether any would be accepting the invitation.
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