Hutchison 3G Austria proposes to roll-out an UMTS network in Austria that will be open to any other service provider or MVNO. Original press release in German here. (Friends over at WiMAX Coop, check this out!)
A little bit of background: Hutchison 3G Austria is a 100% subsidiary of Hutchison Whampoa Limited and obtained an UMTS license in Austria in November 2000. The license comes with the requirement to cover 50% of the Austrian population. Those familiar with the geography of Austria know that that large parts are mountanious and that half of Austria's population of 8,1 Mio. people is concentrated in roughly 20 cities, of which Vienna and suburbs alone have 2 Mio. Hence, Austria consists of many regions that can would commonly described as rural areas. Rural areas are in general less likely to see the roll-out of mobile broadband services, due to their low population density (digital divide): network cells are not "loaded" in low density areas, and networks not operating near peak capacity are economically not attractive for commercial operators.
3 wants to cover more than the 50% required and estimates that an additional 2.500 base stations for are needed to do so (try this link for an overview of 3G network planning basics), leading to an upfront investment of 100 Mio. €, or 40.000 € per base station for "NETCO" (realistic, but on the lower end, I would say). 3 points out that it's not the initial investment but rather the ongoing maintenance costs that make it hard to profitably run the network. So by sharing these costs, the risk is spread across more than one party. 3 says that they have already progressed in talks with potential partners including investors and that the kick-off can be expected soon, which I interprete as this year.
I believe this is a worthwile project. Obviously, 3 is not doing this for altruistic reasons. The project has the advantage that 3 would reach nationwide coverage while dividing investment and costs with its partners. Their core network would see higher utilization rates due to the increased traffic and therefore fixed costs could be spread over more units. The additional competition for 3 due to the openness of the network is not really relevant in my view, as competition already exists on a nationwide scale. In short, the sum of the parts would equal more than 1 for 3, and there would be the benefit of a nationwide UMTS coverage for the population and the economy of Austria.
I suggest that some of the states looking at (and banning) municipal wireless networks take this as a case study.
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