October 11, 2009

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Next Gen Nationwide Broadband Network & Startups

by jitsion

fibre opticsThe highly anticipated Next Gen Nationwide Broadband Network(Next Gen NBN) will slowly roll out in Q1 of 2010 providing speed of upto 1Gbps within Singapore. By end of 2010, it is targeted that 60% of Singapore will finish their installation and will be plugged into this fibre network. As part of the Intelligent Nation 2015 (iN2015) master plan, the government has set a tremendous vision on how this network will propel Singapore forward to become an intelligent nation powered by info-communications. The extensive ultra-high speed NBN is slated to catalyze the creation of innovative services to homes, businesses and even schools which results in overall nationwide economical gain by being more productive & competitive regionally and globally.

Next Gen NBN Industry Structure (Picture from IDA website)
Next Gen NBN Industry Structure

There are 3 main tiers of parties involved in this huge government structure, planned by the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA). The NetCo (OpenNet) is mainly involved in the passive infrastructure and overall maintenance of the “hardware” portion. The OpCo (Nucleus Connect) is mainly tasked to handle and regulate the whole-selling of the bandwidth and services. Then comes the Retail Services Provider (RSP) layer that leverages on the NBN in providing a  wide range of services and applications. Global watchers can be rest assured that tier 1 & 2 are definitely achievable with our government’s pristine track record. What is challenging is getting the correct RSPs and the eco-system right, which kind of mirrors the startup and investment scene as well (startups as RSPs, National Research Foundation as the government agency to create catalytic elements in the startup eco-system).

In order to start off creating this pool of RSPs, IDA created an event series. The Lighthouse Series is a “suite of information-sharing and networking sessions” that aims to provide “RSPs with insights into potential business opportunities enabled by the Next Gen NBN”. The latest upcoming workshop is the “VC pitch Workshop for Next Gen NBN RSPs” conducted by Douglas Abrams from Expara Ventures. Other than just such events, there is a strong need to engage the relevant parties, startups especially, that can innovate in short amount of time-frame with much lesser cost. There needs to be more open forums where we can have direct engagement and discussions on this technology within the current startup eco-system. It would be intriguing to see new (& existing) Interactive Digital Media startups leveraging on this high speed network to increase their value proposition which in turn can create sustainable in-Singapore business models to fuel their expansion into overseas market. Locals have always believed that the Singapore market is unsustainable simply because of its size but perhaps with NBN, certain startups can find a better foothold in Singapore.

Video on Next Gen NBN (10mins)

Picture Courtesy: IDA (http://www.ida.gov.sg)

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  • http://twitter.com/E27sg E27sg

    Implication of Next-Gen broadband network on Startups http://bit.ly/YFCZO
    This comment was originally posted on Twitter

  • http://twitter.com/E27sg E27sg

    Implication of Next-Gen broadband network on Startups http://bit.ly/YFCZO

    This comment was originally posted on Twitter

  • http://twitter.com/RyanLou RyanLou

    RT @E27sg: Implication of Next-Gen broadband network on Startups http://bit.ly/YFCZO
    This comment was originally posted on Twitter

  • http://twitter.com/RyanLou RyanLou

    RT @E27sg: Implication of Next-Gen broadband network on Startups http://bit.ly/YFCZO

    This comment was originally posted on Twitter

  • http://topsy.com/tb/bit.ly/YFCZO Tweets that mention Next Gen Nationwide Broadband Network & Startups » e27 – Discovering Web Innovation in Asia — Topsy.com

    [...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by RyanLou. RyanLou said: RT @E27sg: Implication of Next-Gen broadband network on Startups http://bit.ly/YFCZO [...]

  • http://twitter.com/garag3 garag3

    RT @e27sg Implication of Next-Gen broadband network on Startups http://bit.ly/YFCZO
    This comment was originally posted on Twitter

  • http://twitter.com/garag3 garag3

    RT @e27sg Implication of Next-Gen broadband network on Startups http://bit.ly/YFCZO

    This comment was originally posted on Twitter

  • http://www.isyndica.com Hugo

    Great idea but let’s put it in perspective. Singapore is investing a lot of money to put 1 GBPs connection to 5 Million people (Assuming 100% penetration). Singapore is an island. SIngapore’s main data feeds are probably coming from the US, China or Europe. It doesn’t solve the problem that Singapore is under capacity when it comes to traffic going in and out.

    With 1GBPs on the land, but nothing to go in/out, it will only restrict the ability of those services to reach out to data centers across the world. 5 million people will never generate the amount of data of the billion of internet users out there. Just facebook has 250million users…

    Singapore has built a great port! Why did it work? it works because singapore provides an efficient and fast operation, conveniently located (Asian gateway). Singapore doesn’t have the consumption that China or the US do. The same applies to its bandwitdth. Make it fast and people would locate their data centers/services here.

  • http://www.isyndica.com Hugo

    Great idea but let’s put it in perspective. Singapore is investing a lot of money to put 1 GBPs connection to 5 Million people (Assuming 100% penetration). Singapore is an island. SIngapore’s main data feeds are probably coming from the US, China or Europe. It doesn’t solve the problem that Singapore is under capacity when it comes to traffic going in and out.

    With 1GBPs on the land, but nothing to go in/out, it will only restrict the ability of those services to reach out to data centers across the world. 5 million people will never generate the amount of data of the billion of internet users out there. Just facebook has 250million users…

    Singapore has built a great port! Why did it work? it works because singapore provides an efficient and fast operation, conveniently located (Asian gateway). Singapore doesn’t have the consumption that China or the US do. The same applies to its bandwitdth. Make it fast and people would locate their data centers/services here.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/James-Chan/217458 James Chan

    An excerpt from my recent post on the same topic.

    I love speed, and appreciate our government’s efforts at putting Singapore within bragging range of Asia’s internet speed demons; but really, why the heck are we spending S$750 million of taxpayer’s money on fiber to the home when we aren’t proportionately increasing our external bandwidth? Singapore may be a reliable data center location for South-east Asia, but we have yet to gain serious traction in our initiatives to attract popular overseas content to be mirrored out of Singapore. It’s no secret that the high cost of power (due to Singapore’s dependency on imported fuel) has been the stumbling block for Google’s server farms to be co-located in Singapore together with its Singapore office. The argument for futuristic high-bandwidth services to enhance the way we live, work and play remains a weak sell, since you don’t really need 1Gbps when we have yet to break a sweat downloading porn, bootleg software and games and watching video on our existing hybrid coaxial-fiber (HFC) infrastructure.

    Yet, rationality never gets much say in the face of a combined force of the pages of history (á la Singapore ONE) and a desire for parity with Singapore’s oft-mentioned broadband-crazy competitors. Just as it was in the case of Singtel winning the broadcast rights for EPL, the case for expensive clunky fiber has been endorsed, signed and sealed. Build a field of dreams, and the rest will fall into place. Resistance is futile. HSDPA, 4G and WiMax be damned. Death to pragmatism.

    At S$750 million for approximately 3.2 million Singaporeans, the final bill comes up to a mere S$234.38 per Singaporean to gain access to a thin flexible glass rod. Surely this must be something we citizens of a first-world nation can afford?

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/James-Chan/217458 <fb:name linked="false" useyou="false" uid="217458">James Chan</fb:name>

    An excerpt from my recent post on the same topic.

    I love speed, and appreciate our government’s efforts at putting Singapore within bragging range of Asia’s internet speed demons; but really, why the heck are we spending S$750 million of taxpayer’s money on fiber to the home when we aren’t proportionately increasing our external bandwidth? Singapore may be a reliable data center location for South-east Asia, but we have yet to gain serious traction in our initiatives to attract popular overseas content to be mirrored out of Singapore. It’s no secret that the high cost of power (due to Singapore’s dependency on imported fuel) has been the stumbling block for Google’s server farms to be co-located in Singapore together with its Singapore office. The argument for futuristic high-bandwidth services to enhance the way we live, work and play remains a weak sell, since you don’t really need 1Gbps when we have yet to break a sweat downloading porn, bootleg software and games and watching video on our existing hybrid coaxial-fiber (HFC) infrastructure.

    Yet, rationality never gets much say in the face of a combined force of the pages of history (á la Singapore ONE) and a desire for parity with Singapore’s oft-mentioned broadband-crazy competitors. Just as it was in the case of Singtel winning the broadcast rights for EPL, the case for expensive clunky fiber has been endorsed, signed and sealed. Build a field of dreams, and the rest will fall into place. Resistance is futile. HSDPA, 4G and WiMax be damned. Death to pragmatism.

    At S$750 million for approximately 3.2 million Singaporeans, the final bill comes up to a mere S$234.38 per Singaporean to gain access to a thin flexible glass rod. Surely this must be something we citizens of a first-world nation can afford?

  • http://twitter.com/SoulSoup SoulSoup

    RT @tweetmeme Next Gen Nationwide Broadband Network & Startups » e27 – Discovering Web Innovation in Asia http://retwt.me/PXbn
    This comment was originally posted on Twitter

  • http://twitter.com/SoulSoup SoulSoup

    RT @tweetmeme Next Gen Nationwide Broadband Network & Startups » e27 – Discovering Web Innovation in Asia http://retwt.me/PXbn

    This comment was originally posted on Twitter

  • jitsion

    Hi,
    Thanks guys for your comments. Singapore does need the extra bandwidth to important data centers of the world, there are progress on those as well. Most recently being the Asia-America Gateway (AAG), $500m co-invested by 17 companies across SEA. IDA claims Singapore is linked with an overall 28Tbit/s capacity in all those submarine cables to other countries, but none seems to link direct to US(except the upcoming AAG).

    Another economic point that I did not mention is that all the in-Singapore developed technologies/services for the network can be potentially exported out to other countries/cities that are rolling out their own fibre system in the future. Perhaps this is an additional reason on investing in this infrastructure.

  • jitsion

    Hi,
    Thanks guys for your comments. Singapore does need the extra bandwidth to important data centers of the world, there are progress on those as well. Most recently being the Asia-America Gateway (AAG), $500m co-invested by 17 companies across SEA. IDA claims Singapore is linked with an overall 28Tbit/s capacity in all those submarine cables to other countries, but none seems to link direct to US(except the upcoming AAG).

    Another economic point that I did not mention is that all the in-Singapore developed technologies/services for the network can be potentially exported out to other countries/cities that are rolling out their own fibre system in the future. Perhaps this is an additional reason on investing in this infrastructure.

  • http://twitter.com/marcothesis marcothesis

    Next Gen Nationwide Broadband Network & Startups in Singapore: http://j.mp/JB5Ti
    This comment was originally posted on Twitter

  • http://twitter.com/marcothesis marcothesis

    Next Gen Nationwide Broadband Network & Startups in Singapore: http://j.mp/JB5Ti

    This comment was originally posted on Twitter

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