Sunrise more than doubles peak speed in cable network
Published: Thursday, May 30th 2024, 07:50
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Sunrise is giving the traditional cable network a boost: the telecom provider is more than doubling peak speeds.
From August, the maximum speed will be increased from 1 gigabit per second (Gbit/s) to up to 2.5 Gbit/s, Sunrise announced in a press release on Thursday. This will extend its lead over the competition. 80 percent of households will be able to access such speeds.
The new fiber optic networks are much more modern and currently offer top speeds of up to 10 Gbit/s at Swisscom. This means that Swisscom's fiber optic network, which is also used by Sunrise and Salt, is still four times faster than the new maximum speed on Sunrise's cable network.
But Swisscom's fiber optic network currently only reaches 47% of households. That is a good 2.5 million connections. By the end of next year, coverage should reach 57 percent. Then 3.1 million households would be connected to the ultra-fast data highways of the "blue giant". Including third-party networks, around two thirds of homes and businesses in Switzerland will have a fiber optic connection by 2025.
Although Swisscom's old copper network has better coverage than the cable networks or fiber optics, at just over 200 megabits per second it is nowhere near their speeds.
Costs of 40 to 60 million
Sunrise CEO André Krause told the news agency AWP that certain services, such as TV channels, had been relocated in order to expand capacity in the cable network. Because the upgrade was mainly carried out via software, it was relatively inexpensive. It cost a mid double-digit million amount. That would be 40 to 60 million francs.
The increase in speed to 2.5 Gbit/s will benefit 250,000 households that currently have a 1 Gbit/s subscription. Of these, around 90,000 would need a new modem, which would cost a one-off fee of CHF 49, explained Krause. Customers no longer have to pay for the subscription.
However, the transmission speed (upload) remains unchanged at 100 Mbit/s. The decision was made not to increase this because this would have been at the expense of the download speed, said Krause.
The new speed is only available for Sunrise subscriptions. Krause said that it had not yet been decided when they would be introduced for the low-cost brand Yallo.
With the new maximum speed, the cable network has reached its limits with the current Docsis 3.1 technology. Theoretically, it could be accelerated to 10 Gbit/s with the new Docsis 4.0 technology. However, this would be significantly more expensive because a lot of electronic parts in the network would have to be replaced, explained Krause: "We are evaluating this. But I'm not sure whether we will take the step."
Preparations for IPO on schedule
The separation from the parent company Liberty Global through a listing on the Swiss stock exchange SIX is proceeding according to plan. The various documents for the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) are currently being prepared, said Krause.
Once the SEC has given the green light, Liberty Global shareholders could vote on the separation from Sunrise at a general meeting. Sunrise then plans to hold a capital market day in the fall for the IPO on the Swiss stock exchange.
But even after the separation from the US group, the TV reception boxes and the TV platform would continue to come from Liberty Global. "We have concluded corresponding supplier contracts," said Krause.
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