Broadband / FTTH fibre optic expansion

Liechtensteinische Kraftwerke (LKW), the country's utility provider, provides Liechtenstein's service providers with a needs-based network infrastructure in accordance with Article 5 of the relevant law (Act on LKW) and its ownership strategy (in German), so that the providers can offer their customers high-quality and state-of-the-art services (telephone services, site connectivity, broadband internet, TV, mobile phone services, etc.).

In recent years, there has been a strong and steady increase in data consumption in both private and business environments, and there is no end in sight to this trend. The copper network (copper wire pairs, coax) as a carrier for data traffic will no longer be able to keep up with this development in the medium to long term.

Nationwide fibre optic expansion, decommissioning of copper networks

For this reason, the decision was made that LKW, in coordination with the service providers operating in the country, carry out a gradual nationwide expansion of fibre optics, connect all app. 11,200 buildings and gradually decommission the old copper networks. By installing fibre optics in residential and commercial buildings, the long-term demand for bandwidth will be met and the attractiveness of the country as a place to live and do business will be ensured. The gradual decommissioning of the copper networks will also result in operational efficiency gains for LKW and the service providers, which will ultimately benefit end users.

Point-to-point (P2P) FTTB

The network architecture used by LKW is based on the "point-to-point FTTB" concept (FTTB: fibre to the building). This means that per usage unit (industrial/office space/residential), LKW provides two dedicated "point-to-point" optical fibres from the connection centre to each building connection. The building owner is responsible for installing the building cabling from the FTTB network termination point in the building to the optical telecommunication outlet (OTO) in the usage units. The building cabling complements the P2P FTTB system to form a P2P FTTH network architecture (fiber to the home).

Each service provider can therefore provide the service requested by the customer via an unshared fibre. This allows the service provider to operate the fibre optic connection independently and use any desired technology. This is future-proof and promotes innovation and competition.

Timetable

The expansion rate of the nationwide fibre optic network is over 99%. This figure relates to around 26,000 usage units that need to be connected. Once the last units have been connected, all usage units in the country will have a fibre optic connection – without discrimination in terms of location or building size. The decommissioning and conversion of the last copper connections will be completed at the beginning of 2024.

Last amended: December 2023