If you was the company taking over Digital Region

[SpencerUk]

What would you do now to save it? I'm interested to hear people's ideas.

[alexatkin]

Well, it all comes down to money doesn't it.

First and foremost, they need to eat the installation fee so the ISPs don't have to.
Secondly, they need to help with advertising.

But both of those things require investment and seeing as they will already be in debt, its hard to see how that would work.

I'm willing to bet that some stupid law prevents a council run project from advertising due to competition with private enterprise. There is bound to be more to this than meets the eye.

[Nutty34]

To be honest guys most people will look no further than BT/Sky etc. I only signed up to DR as at the time I had no alternative in terms of FTTC. Since signing up I now have the choice of both BT and Sky fibre. When my contract ends it is probable that I will move to Sky or Plusnet as the pricing is better.

As far as I can see the only viable option for DR is BT Wholsale ?

[alexatkin]

Indeed, most people just get broadband from their phone line or television provider. BT,Talk Talk,Sky and Virgin pretty much rule the roost. Digital Region needed to make it cheap and easy for one of those to come on board.

Its sad, I'm pretty sure Talk Talk would have been itching to come on board had they made it cheap and easy to do so. I fear Digital Region suffered from their own egos a bit there, not willing to offer a mediocre service for the likes of Talk Talk and thus limiting their customer base.

It should be perfectly possible to have a highly contended service for the likes of Talk Talk while having less contention for more expensive ISPs. They need to get people on the network and THEN try to encourage them to upgrade to higher packages, its pretty much what the main ISPs do.

[WillPS]

I'd arrange meetings with TalkTalk, Sky and EE, and basically work out what it is that they'd need to become a DR ISP (and bring over their existing fibre customers).

Without at least one such partnership the network probably would struggle, but if that was the case I'd launch a new ISP brand, aim for price (so offer something like Ignition but with no installation), launch a YouView service (or possibly license TalkTalk's if they were willing) and a WRL service; aim for a price near or ideally just beneath what TalkTalk themselves offer. Make it a seriously cheap service. Mailshot, possibly take slots on Yorkshire ITV.

[SpencerUk]

Me and @WillPS have the right idea here

I'd practically beg TalkTalk, EE & Sky along with every small reseller to come over. I'd also launch my own branded ISP too for people who want to try to the bleeding edge stuff with the design to get people onto the fastest connections possible.

I'd hold a quarterly community open forum in regards to the network to keep raising awareness too.

Failing that, I'd sell it to Virgin Media and let them do what they want with it.

[mirdragon]

As I posted on SF, they should have gone independent all the way similar to Kingston upon Hull, especially as KCOM helped build the network (AFAIK)

If they done this it would have been a success

[essenby]

KCOM had a big advantage though - BT does not have, and are not allowed, a presence in their area. From that aspect KCOM have an absolute monopoly. Although I believe there is competition in the business space now from MS3.

[SpencerUk]

KCOM is basically the Openreach version but just in Hull.

I'd say its been a success as you don't hear it in the news losing money or anything. Saying that however, there isn't much competitor selection

[essenby]

It's easy to keep your head above water if you have a captive consumer base. If you live in the KCOM area, and you want a telephone line, you get it from KCOM. Subscribers there don't even have the option of switching telephone services to another provider because that nearly always requires a BT line, which they can't get. Even though they can get SKY satellite services - they can't get SKY broadband, and that is a very sore point amongst a number of my friends/relatives.

As I said, on the domestic front at least, KCOM have an absolute monopoly.