18 DECEMBER 2008 -- Following the first meeting of the Very High Speed Broadband Committee, which took place this morning at the office of the Secretary of State for the Development of the Digital Economy in the presence of the President of ARCEP (the regulatory body for electronic communications in France), Numericable, Orange, and SFR signed an agreement setting out the conditions for sharing fiber-optic cables in buildings installed by either of them and examined the best way to use existing infrastructures. In this way, residents in all buildings in concerned areas will be able to choose from amongs the three operators.
The signatories agreed to implement "a single mode solution" in zones where they currently deploy or soon plan to deploy their networks. Each residence will be equipped with a special fiber allocated to the operator chosen by the subscriber at the shared access point.
They also agreed to deploy "multi mode fibers" in the 15th arrondissement of Paris and in a provincial town to support a new engineering technique consisting of installing four fibers per residence so that each operator can connect to their network at the shared access point.
This agreement is open to all other operators who want to become involved.
Through the agreement, the signatories say they have adopted a pragmatic and open attitude and have agreed to adapt their terms and conditions in relation to feedback from tests and the initial deployments.
They are actively participating in the work implemented by the Secretary of State and ARCEP, aiming to draw conclusions from the different tests carried out and on the condition that they continue to operate infrastructure deployed before this date.
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