Within the framework of the State aid guidelines, the German government is promoting the expansion of fibre optic networks in regions where a commercial rollout is not economically viable. To ensure that customers in these areas also benefit from competition, legal provisions require third parties access to the subsidised infrastructure. Wholesale access products available for this purpose include bitstream or duct access, but also the unbundled fibre local loop. For the first time, the Federal Ministry of Digital and Transport, with the participation of the Federal Network Agency, has now laid down ‘the conditions and prices for third-party access at the wholesale level to the subsidised network’. In accordance with the framework regulation, either average published prices from comparable areas, regulated wholesale prices or prices determined on the basis of cost orientation can be applied.
WIK-Consult calculated the prices for unbundled fibre optic local loop on the basis of cost orientation. The network and investment modelling was carried out on the basis of the Analytical Cost Model for Access Networks 3.0 and supplemented by a cost calculation.
Taking into account current building locations with associated information on households and businesses as well as the current road network, access networks with an FTTH point-to-point topology were modelled for the whole of Germany. On this basis, efficient network routing was determined and evaluated for comprehensive coverage with fibre optic connections.
As a result, WIK-Consult was able to determine fees of €22.82 for the monthly provision of the unbundled fibre local loop at the ODF and €14.71 for the handover at the network distribution point.
The price list with the other wholesale prices is publicly available at:
https://bmdv.bund.de/SharedDocs/DE/Anlage/DG/vorleistungspreise.pdf?__blob=publicationFile
