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Posts Tagged ‘uk communications’

Until 1982, the civil communications system in the UK was a state monopoly known as Post Office Telecommunications. Broadcasting of radio and television was the province of two – BBC and Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA).These two organisations controlled all broadcast services, and directly owned and operated the broadcast transmitter sites. Speaking of telecommunications systems at that time did not yet include mobile phone and Internet services.

But the civil telecommunications monopoly changed with the entry of Mercury Communications in 1983. In 1984, after the Post Office system evolved into BT, it was privatised.In the 90’s, Broadcast Transmitters, which ahd previously belonged to the BBC and IBA, were privatised. They are currently owned by  National Grid Wireless, VT Communications and Arqiva. Telecommunications policies and regulations have gone through many changes and modifications during the same period, and most of the bodies have been merged into Ofcom, the independent regulator and competition authority for the UK communications industries.

Submarine Communications

The UK is a focal point for many of the world’s submarine communications cables, which are mostly digital optical fiber cables.Many satellite links remain operational, but these provide a smaller part of the international bandwidth. Most commercial broadcasting organisations lease transmission facilities from one or more of the transmission companies. But smaller local radio stations are generally self-providing for cost-effectivity reasons.

British Telecom remains as a provider of fixed phone lines and it still has a universal service obligation.  Next to it is Virgin Media, the second biggest player in the residential telephone line market. While other companies provide fixed telephone lines too, their market is mostly large companies in the major cities.

For sure, there are many other providers who sell fixed telephone services carried over BT lines but they generally have no network infrastructure of their own.

Third Generation Licences in the UK

The 3rd generation system is a product of technological improvements, essentially an improvement of the available bandwidth.  This makes it possible for new service offerings to telecommunications subscribers. Such services include streaming of live radio or video, video calls and live TV. The 4 2G companies participated in a competitive auction and were granted 3G licences, as did a new competitor known as 3. As mentioned on BBG Communications blog, the four 3G providers have already rolled out their networks.

In March 2003, the communications provider 3 had the widest 3G coverage as they were the first to offer their network coverage. But Vodafone and Orange rival 3 in terms of its reach.T-Mobile and o2 have good coverage but both generally get concentrated in major cities and less so in rural towns.  However T-Mobile and 3 recently entered into a deal whereby they can use each others 3g coverage.  But in this deal, 3’s 3G customers don’t have access to T-Mobile 2G coverage. An additional agreement has also been struck by 3 with Orange until 2010, under the terms that Orange’s 2G coverage is available to 3 subscribers where no 3G signal exists. This arrangement however, is deemed to become less significant as 3 and T-Mobile roll-out their shared 3G networks. Subscribers of 3 to have the best coverage of any United Kingdom network.