Italy takes steps forward on fiber and becomes the second country in Europe for the growth of Ftth/b fiber infrastructure. This is certified by an iDate study presented by the FTTH Council Europe.
According to the research, out of 28 states belonging to the European Union, Italy with 1,9 million more wired homes from 2018 to 2019 it went from 24% coverage two years ago to around 31% in September 2019, for a total of 8,2 million property units (September 2019 data). As for growth, only France did better than our country, which recorded an increase of 3,5 million wired homes. Bronze medal for Spain, with 1,5 million homes.
"Our country started late compared to others in the construction and use of this type of infrastructure, above all due to the prolonged absence of investments in fixed access networks", he underlined Franco Bassanini, president of Open Fiber, the wholesale operator committed to wiring homes and bringing FTTH fiber (the one that reaches homes directly) throughout Italy. According to the company's plans, the Open Fiber network should reach over 2023 million real estate units by 20. “Since its inception, Open Fiber has always supported the importance of infrastructural competition in the telecommunications sector – continued Bassanini -. A market structure that is already bringing advantages to all citizens and starting to bridge the digital divide, even in the rural and most remote areas of the country".
Broadening the horizon of research to 39 European countries houses wired with fiber are 172 million. Coverage in the Europe of 39 increased by almost 50%, while if we narrow the circle to the Europe of 28 it drops to 39,4%.
Another data provided by the report concerns the number of fiber subscribers for each country and the relative increase. In this ranking, despite the progress made on the infrastructure and the strong increase in users (+45,3%), Italy ranks only 34th out of 39 countries by number of fiber subscribers. Worse than us, however, are two big names like Germany and the United Kingdom, respectively in 36th and 37th place.
