1. Creating a gigabit optical fibre network
for Germany by 2025
High-performance broadband networks are the foundation and driver of digitisation and are therefore indispensible for Germany’s digital future. Without
sufficient information highways, Germany cannot successfully accomplish the
process of digitisation that is progressing at an ever increasing speed. For this
reason that we must create a viable digital infrastructure that can support the
triple requirements of high capacity, broad availability and low latency.
• Capacity: The volume of data transmitted in the Internet per minute is growing at an
exorbitant rate on all network levels. The global data volume on the landline network
is doubling every 40 months, and in the mobile radio networks, every 18 months.
Whereas global IP traffic is around 718 exabytes (718 billion gigabytes), this volume
will most likely approximately triple to 2 trillion gigabytes as early as 2019.2
• Availability: Germany’s Internet is not fast. Currently, 96% of households have access
to LTE networks with at least 2 Mbps, however only 6% have access to 16 Mbps.3
The average data signalling rate in Germany in the second quarter of 2015 was around
10.7 Mbps, with peak rates ranging at 46.8 Mbps.4 Only about 15% of Internet access
points used in Germany achieved data signalling rates exceeding 15 Mbps.5 Only 7%
of households have access to optical fibre cable, and only a little over 1% of broadband customers use this type of connection.6 Adequate offers for commercial
customers, in particular affordable gigabit connections for small and medium-sized
businesses, are often not even available. Only large companies can afford their own
optical fibre connection. Other countries are significantly ahead of us in this regard.7
2 Source: Cisco Visual Networking Index (VNI) 2015, http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/solutions/collateral/service-provider/ip-ngn-ip-nextgeneration-network/white_paper_c11-481360.html
3 Source: Breitbandatlas (an atlas of broadband connections published by the BMWi).
4 Based on the Akamai Content Delivery Network (Source: Akamai State of the Internet Q2 2015 Report.
5 In the USA, this figure is 21%, UK 23%, the Netherlands 32%, Switzerland 34%, Japan 38% and in South Korea 53% (ibid.).
6 In the USA, this figure was 9%, Netherlands 10%, Switzerland approx. 12%, Denmark well over 21%, Spain 12%, Sweden 44%, South Korea 68% and
Japan around 73% (source: OECD broadband portal, status: 12/2014; also the 17th Telecommunications Market Study by VATM/Dialog Consult).
7 South Korea: 23.1 resp. 83.3 Mbps; Japan 16.4 resp. 75.1 Mbps; the Netherlands 15.2 resp. 60.9 Mbps; Switzerland 15.5 resp. 59.4 Mbps;
Singapore 12.7 resp. 108.3 Mbps (ibid.).
www.de.digital
13