At heart of the plan will be moves by the European Investment Bank (EIB) to provide finance for installing networks as part of a wider strategy of refocusing its lending priorities on the EU 2020 Innovation plan.
The Commission calls on Member States to introduce operational broadband plans for high and ultra high-speed networks, backed by concrete implementation measures. In total, it is estimated that between €180 to € 270 billion of investment is required to bring fast broadband to all households by 2020.
The EIB is currently lends an average of €2bn each year to broadband projects, with recent beneficiaries including the French broadband operator Iliad, the Finnish operator DNA and the Portuguese operator Zon. Now, EIB’s involvement in broadband financing will increase as it re-focuses its lending strategy on the EU 2020 priorities. The Commission hopes the EIB’s commitments will underpin gross investment up to 15 times greater. The EU’s structural and rural development funds will also be brought into play to fund new networks.
The Commission also wants to accelerate the deployment of wireless technologies which offer broadband connections faster than 30Mbps speed and are cheaper to install than fixed line connections.
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