Dhe Federal Minister responsible for digital affairs, Volker Wissing (FDP), has given the telecommunications companies a new goal: by 2025, every second household in Germany should be able to be connected to a fiber optic network.
Five years later, the fast fiber optic Internet connections should then be available across the board in every household. This emerges from a cornerstone paper with which the ministry outlines its gigabit strategy.
“We want the digital awakening for Germany,” said Wissing after a discussion with representatives of companies and associations in Berlin. “For this we need powerful digital infrastructures everywhere, that means fiber optics right into the house and the latest mobile communications standard.”
The gigabit strategy should make the expansion faster and more efficient. However, there will be no more money for the expansion. A maximum of one billion euros per year is earmarked for funding, said Wissing.
The minister called his project “ambitious”. But with the expanding companies, he is running into open doors. Tim Höttges, head of Deutsche Telekom, has repeatedly mentioned the goal of nationwide fiber optic expansion for all companies by 2030.
return with the fiber optic expansion
The fact that the funding pot is not larger does not bother the economy. The associations and companies in the telecommunications industry point out that money is currently not the problem for rapid gigabit expansion in Germany.
“Until 2025, companies have an investment potential of ten to twelve billion euros per year for the expansion of fixed and mobile networks,” said Bernhard Rohleder, CEO of the digital association Bitkom. This means that up to 50 billion euros of privately financed funds could flow into network expansion in this legislative period.
A large number of expansion projects have been announced in the recent past. Investors hope for sustained returns from a stable infrastructure business.
Today, almost two-thirds of all households have the option of booking a connection with gigabit speed, but most of them via the TV cable. However, the glass fiber is more powerful and achieves significantly higher speeds.
In the meantime, 7.5 million households could be connected to the fiber optic network, but only a third make use of it because the tariffs here are higher than with previous connections. Most of the connections are currently provided by Telekom’s competitors, including companies such as Deutscheglas fiber, EWE and M-Net. Telekom had announced that it would offer fiber optic connections to ten million customers by 2024.
federal states at Gigabit expansion required
With the gigabit strategy, the federal government has taken up some of the demands that companies and associations have repeatedly raised. “Bitkom has been pointing out for years that the network expansion can be massively accelerated with simple measures, including in the area of construction and administrative law,” said Rohleder. The new federal government is now tackling these tasks in a targeted manner.
However, the decisions are often made elsewhere. “We need the commitment of the federal states for this,” said Wissing. You should now make appropriate changes to the law by the end of the year.
It is often the building authorities where the approval procedures take a long time and where alternative laying techniques for fiber optic cables are blocked. If companies didn’t have to dig deep and instead laid the lines using a trenching or milling process, not only costs could be saved. Fiber optic expansion could also be accelerated in this way. However, the permits for this are often not issued.
Long approval procedures also hamper the expansion of mobile communications. At more than 1000 locations, the mobile phone companies are currently making no progress with their expansion projects for mobile phone systems. Here, the Digital Ministry proposes the possibility of an early start of construction before approval is given. In addition, changes to existing radio masts should not have to be approved again.
Companies are particularly afraid of competing with subsidies in expansion areas. “We will not be able to achieve accelerated fiber optic expansion and gigabit coverage in Germany by 2030 if we do not manage to limit funding procedures to areas in which it is unlikely that commercial expansion will be possible,” said David Zimmer, President of the association the provider of telecommunications and value-added services (VATM).
That is why the new federal government must absolutely comply with the goal set in the coalition agreement of giving priority to rapid and self-sufficient expansion. Zimmer had already pointed out in the past that the subsidized expansion would not only be more expensive, but would also take at least two to three years longer.
In his key issues paper, the digital minister now provides for accelerated funding procedures. The gigabit strategy is to be decided by the cabinet before the summer break.
Rapid implementation of the gigabit strategy
The economy is also demanding that the federal government work more quickly when developing its digital strategy. “In the first 100 days, the focus was on questions of responsibility between the individual ministries, not the announced digital dawn,” said Bitkom President Achim Berg.
“This has to change quickly now, because time is pressing.” The digital strategy must now be presented urgently so that Germany’s digital policy no longer remains a patchwork of individual measures, but is designed in a targeted manner and from a single source.
“In Europe, Germany is only a digital mediocrity, globally the gap to pioneers like the USA is growing more and more, countries like Denmark are up to 20 years ahead of us in key areas of digital policy,” said Berg. This applies, for example, to the digitization of schools and the health care system or to digital administration and electronic identities.
“Everything on shares” is the daily stock exchange shot from the WELT business editorial team. Every morning from 7 a.m. with our financial journalists. For stock market experts and beginners. Subscribe to the podcast at Spotify, Apple Podcast, Amazon Music and Deezer. Or directly by RSS-Feed.