French government supports satellite broadband
December 18, 2017
By Chris Forrester
The French government is backing new measures to help boost broadband take-up in the country. The new initiative includes funding €150 per home to equip satellite or 4G reception.
The intention is to reduce the number of households with low-quality (or zero) internet access from today’s typical 15 per cent to just 6 per cent by 2020.
Investment bank Exane/BNPP says this will help Eutelsat, and its joint-venture partner ViaSat, in filling some of its available capacity.
“Assuming 10 percent of the 2 million French households take a Eutelsat satellite access package we estimate that Eutelsat would generate €30-40 million of additional annual revenues, or about.2-3 per cent of group revenues. Consensus expects around €30 million [overall] revenue growth for Eutesat’s Fixed Broadband division, including Russia, Sub-Saharan Africa and other countries. These expectations [as a result of the French initiative] could be met by France alone,” says the bank.
“In other words, we take this announcement as a positive for Eutelsat. It underpins its residential broadband strategy and offers support to consensus expectations.”