“Study Group on State of Metal Line Costs” to be Held

1.Background and purpose

  The number of contracts of subscriber telephones, direct-access telephones and DSL has been on a downward trend, and it marked a decrease of about 9%, 8% and 18%, respectively, in FY2011. Such decrease in the demand for metal lines has had substantial effect on dry copper connection charge imposed by NTT East and West.
  On the other hand, there is still a certain level of number of users of direct-access telephones and DSL services provided through metal lines by connection carriers. In particular, there are 6.344 million contracts for DSL services (as of the end of June 2012), and there are places where optical services are not available yet in those DSL service areas.
  In the context of these circumstances, in December 2011, a report from the Information and Communications Council titled “State of Environmental Improvement for Promotion of Broadband Dissemination” (hereinafter “Broadband Report”) stated that it is appropriate to verify costs related to (1) handling of unused core lines, (2) service life of metal lines and (3) allocation method of facility maintenance costs for metal lines and optical fiber lines, concerning the state of calculation of connection charge for metal lines that are in the transition stage, and continue to deliberate on further optimization thereof.
  The “Study Group on State of Metal Line Costs” will be held based on the Broadband Report in order to implement verification, etc. of costs toward further optimization and improvement of predictability concerning the state of calculation of connection charge for metal lines.
 

2.Major points to be deliberated

  (1) Handling of cost on unused core lines of metal cables
  (2) Service life related to metal lines
  (3) Allocation method of facility maintenance costs for metal lines and optical fiber lines
  (4) Others
 

3.Schedule

  This Study Group will hold the first meeting on November 6 (Tue), 2012.