Fast Internet: Industry association VATM considers the demands of the federal states to be excessive

The discussion about a draft law of the Bundestag for the ordinance for the right to supply with telecommunications services (RaVT) is entering a new round. After the Federal Council initially criticized the draft and considered it not far-reaching enough, the industry association of providers of telecommunications and value-added services (VATM) expressed initial concerns about the feasibility of the Federal Council’s plans.

Federal Council demands 30 MBit/s instead of 10 MBit/s downstream

On June 10, 2022, the Federal Council will vote on the draft for the RaVT, in which 10 Mbit/s download, 1.7 Mbit/s upload and a latency of 150ms are planned as the minimum standard for Internet connections. However, these values ​​do not go far enough for the federal states: Instead, they require 30.8 Mbit/s for downloads and 5.2 Mbit/s for uploads, as internal reports from the Federal Council’s transport committee show.

Exactly this requirement goes too far for the industry association VATM. Its managing director told the Golem editors:
“Efforts on the part of the federal states to raise the minimum requirements as part of the so-called download speed to 30 Mbit/s threaten to make it impossible for the population that is most affected to be supplied quickly.”

A download rate of 30 MBit/s is “technically unjustifiable” and legally impermissible, as well as “absolutely counterproductive, since a multiplication of the applicants would not be manageable for the authority, but also for the utility companies”. In his opinion, an increase in the minimum requirements as defined by the Federal Council would in turn lead to a significant delay in the expansion and thus mean that many households would have to wait even longer for fast (fiber optic) Internet. However, the Transport Committee has not yet issued a statement on this.

Source: golem