FTTH Council Europe Award winners 2012 announced in Munich

During the final hours of the busiest FTTH Conference to date, the newly created FTTH Council Europe Awards were presented in two categories: Individual Award and Operators Award. The awards are given to an individual and an operator that have made an outstanding contribution to the FTTH adoption in Europe in the last year. In a voting process, the Board of Directors and the Committee Chairs of the FTTH Council Europe have chosen the winners out of a list of nominees. The nomination was open to everyone through an online form.
This first ever FTTH Council Europe Individual Award was given to Neelie Kroes, European Commissioner Digital Agenda, for her long-standing, ongoing, and well-defined efforts to make FTTH a reality across Europe. In her closing plenary speech at the FTTH Conference 2011 in Milan, Neelie Kroes clearly expressed her views on fibre. She regards access to superfast broadband for all Europeans as central to Europe’s economic future, and considers this ambition to be the heart of Europe’s Digital Agenda.
Commissioner Kroes stated: “I am honoured to be the first winner of the FTTH Council Europe Award. The Digital Agenda targets on fast and ultra-fast Internet access are an important objective for Europe to ensure social inclusion and competitiveness. I will continue my efforts to ensure that ultra-fast Internet is soon available to as many European households as possible. This calls on all players in the sector to play their role. And I am happy to see that the FTTH Council Europe, with its focus on fibre-based NGA access, is supporting those efforts.”
The 2012 winner in the Operator category is Altibox, who have realised very high household penetration numbers in Norway. Their enthusiasm for FTTH has resulted in a very successful concept. This combines unique go-to-market approach, highly appealing applications that were developed in-house and with selected experts, plus an original franchise system involving subsidiaries and partners. Quite an achievement in Norway’s highly competitive market and a testament to entrepreneurial creativity backed by fibre technology!
Altibox CEO Leif Aarthun Ims declared: “Altibox is very honoured to receive this award. We were among the pioneers in the ‘fibre-to-the home’ business when we started ten years back. Our approach has always been customer-driven. Our fibre roll-out strategy and implementation has resulted in a world class take-rate on our services, the most satisfied customers and leading products in our market, and superior broadband network operations performance. We are determined to continue our growth by delivering 100{e1f18614b95d3cd6e4b3128e1cd15d99b042a60a5a19c19b7a8e07e7495efa10} on future customer expectations.”
The FTTH Council Europe Award ceremony brought to a close the most successful FTTH Conference to date. The event, which was opened by Christian Ude, Lord Mayor of the city of Munich, attracted a record of 3300+ delegates, more than 100 top-tier exhibitors from all over the world and included over 120 high-quality presentations and case studies from renowned industry speakers.
This year’s highlights included the keynote speech from Dr. Peter Cochrane, renowned business and engineering advisor to international industries and governments, who shared his scientifically inspired insights on the fundamental importance of FTTH and its role in the advent of a ‘Smart Planet’.
The 10th FTTH Council Europe Conference will be held in London on 19-21 Feb 2013. This special occasion will, of course, be commemorated in a fitting manner.