Operators typically pay the equivalent of 32% of the first year’s line rental costs in installation charges in Australia, compared to 22% in next-highest China, and just 1% in Hong Kong.
Generally speaking, installation charges in the region are less than 10% of first years’ rental costs – and in seven of the 14 countries surveyed, these costs are less than 5%.
While simple leased circuits are the most typical wholesale access option, groomed circuits capable of supporting multiple customers are popular in some areas.
Their use was only reported in eight of the 14 countries covered – Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, India, Singapore, Taiwan, China and Thailand. Sreenivasan said this was partly due to inadequate data, but also because the services are just not offered in some countries.
But where they are available, they are often an attractive proposition for both ends of the supply chain, Sreenivasan said.
“When using grooming services, both the carrier and the operator save on hardware interfaces (both capex and opex) and provisioning is simpler,” he said. “This translates to cost savings.”
As a result, groomed access is often substantially cheaper, or only slightly more expensive than simple line rental – except in New Zealand, where higher-speed groomed line rental can be 60-90% more expensive than the simple line alternative.