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Profile: Interoute's Lee Myall on enterprise leading govt on fibre roll out
30 Nov 2009 | 17.59 Europe/London
Businesses are driving fibre deployment across Europe at a far greater rate than governments. In fact, corporations and public institutions could even hold the key to widening the UK’s next generation footprint.
That is the conclusion of Lee Myall, UK Regional Director for Interoute, a telecommunications company which claims to have more than 57,000km of ‘lit’ fibre, despite setting up only six years ago.
The company recently announced the opening a point-of-presence (POP) in Moscow and is rapidly expanding its fibre network through east and south east Europe. This is driven by increased demand for better internet connections and virtual private networks (VPNs) in economies which are growing rapidly since recent entry in to the EU.
While there has been much talk among governments across Europe of bridging digital divides, he believes that actually it is enterprises who are doing far more to roll out fast communications.
“I’m not sure we’ve seen a whole lot of action, although there’s been a lot of talk among governments about rolling out fibre,” he says.
“I guess my answer to any question about next generation networks is how many governments can account for 57,000 kilometres of lit fibre? I’m guessing none?”
Enterprise driven
Now, Interoute has not set up in business with the altruistic aim of bringing fibre to not-spots across Europe. Its business is mainly in connecting the many offices of global giants, such as Ford and Nintendo, as well as providing connectivity for fellow telecommunications companies, such as Tiscali.
However, where this becomes truly interesting, Myall contends, is when you start adding up all the fibre that companies, such as Interoute, have available. When you start to look beyond the fibre footprint of, say, BT and Virgin and look at fibre run purely for enterprise as well as networks linking public buildings, such as hospitals and libraries, you start to realise there must be a far better fibre backbone then one first realises.
“I have to say up front that our main network in the UK is London but I would love to see a map of all the fibre there really is in the UK,” he says.
“I’ve no idea if it exists or if you could get it by combining several other maps. But if you had everything in one place you could see where you could take a connection off someone else’s network. I know some fibre campaigners have already done this themselves and some are looking in to it. A good start for the UK government would be to create a full UK fibre map and then look at where the holes are.
"There is so much fibre out there I truly think that a lot of communities could find that although BT isn’t on offer, there just might be a link between two regional offices of a big company or a link to a hospital that they could tap in to.”
Tapping in to fibre
Hence, while Myall think governments across Europe have their hearts in the right places when they talk about the need to roll out fibre so citizens have access to next generation networks, to his mind, it is actually corporations we could end up thanking.
While they may not be making a huge fuss about connecting facilities, they are, in his experience, creating the demand that is laying the backbone of fibre across Europe whose capacity could be increased at a later stage to boost citizens’ broadband speeds.
Mapping these multiple networks is a huge challenge which he believes could speed up connections across Europe far quicker than any series of governmental initiatives.
That is the conclusion of Lee Myall, UK Regional Director for Interoute, a telecommunications company which claims to have more than 57,000km of ‘lit’ fibre, despite setting up only six years ago.
The company recently announced the opening a point-of-presence (POP) in Moscow and is rapidly expanding its fibre network through east and south east Europe. This is driven by increased demand for better internet connections and virtual private networks (VPNs) in economies which are growing rapidly since recent entry in to the EU.
While there has been much talk among governments across Europe of bridging digital divides, he believes that actually it is enterprises who are doing far more to roll out fast communications.
“I’m not sure we’ve seen a whole lot of action, although there’s been a lot of talk among governments about rolling out fibre,” he says.
“I guess my answer to any question about next generation networks is how many governments can account for 57,000 kilometres of lit fibre? I’m guessing none?”
Enterprise driven
Now, Interoute has not set up in business with the altruistic aim of bringing fibre to not-spots across Europe. Its business is mainly in connecting the many offices of global giants, such as Ford and Nintendo, as well as providing connectivity for fellow telecommunications companies, such as Tiscali.
However, where this becomes truly interesting, Myall contends, is when you start adding up all the fibre that companies, such as Interoute, have available. When you start to look beyond the fibre footprint of, say, BT and Virgin and look at fibre run purely for enterprise as well as networks linking public buildings, such as hospitals and libraries, you start to realise there must be a far better fibre backbone then one first realises.
“I have to say up front that our main network in the UK is London but I would love to see a map of all the fibre there really is in the UK,” he says.
“I’ve no idea if it exists or if you could get it by combining several other maps. But if you had everything in one place you could see where you could take a connection off someone else’s network. I know some fibre campaigners have already done this themselves and some are looking in to it. A good start for the UK government would be to create a full UK fibre map and then look at where the holes are.
"There is so much fibre out there I truly think that a lot of communities could find that although BT isn’t on offer, there just might be a link between two regional offices of a big company or a link to a hospital that they could tap in to.”
Tapping in to fibre
Hence, while Myall think governments across Europe have their hearts in the right places when they talk about the need to roll out fibre so citizens have access to next generation networks, to his mind, it is actually corporations we could end up thanking.
While they may not be making a huge fuss about connecting facilities, they are, in his experience, creating the demand that is laying the backbone of fibre across Europe whose capacity could be increased at a later stage to boost citizens’ broadband speeds.
Mapping these multiple networks is a huge challenge which he believes could speed up connections across Europe far quicker than any series of governmental initiatives.