Fibroglobal agrees to lower prices but resists multicast and more bitstream offers

Portuguese fibre operator Fibroglobal has reduced its wholesale high-speed prices in the central part of the country and the Azores after regulator ANACOM intervened.

Fibroglobal reduced its prices by between 30% and 66%, depending on the type of access, depending on the type of access involved.

ANACOM intervened to encourage more use of the wholesale offers by retail operators to enhance competition and investment. It said that it expected the move to result in better access to competitively priced services for residents in the relevant regions.

However, ANACOM said that Fibroglobal had not embraced recommendations it made to the government to force changes in the wholesale offers to create more classes of speed in Fibroglobal’s bitstream offers and the launch of multicast functionality to enable the provision of TV as well as more variegated broadband internet offerings.

ANACOM has been battling to secure lower pricing from rural broadband provider Fibroglobal for some time, following complaints from service providers NOS and Vodafone that the organisation, which was crated in 2010 withi the help of public funds, discriminated in favour of Altice-owned PT Telecom/Meo.