27 Aug 2014, 10:24 am
According to press reports from Singapore, the decision by the Infocomm Development Authority (IDA) ends a four year dispute between the two operators. Previously, cable connection points installed by StarHub in different rooms of the same home could only be used to carry StarHub television and broadband signals throughout the home.
StarHub has agreed to negotiate "in good faith" to allow SingTel to share its in-home cable connection points and has said that it is seeking a "commercially viable solution". According to a report by AsiaOne, the regulator is prepared to allow the use of "isolation filters", which would split cables into two 'lanes', if StarHub does not provide "reasonable access" to SingTel.
The decision also means that other service providers can use the existing cable network within homes to deliver their services, including ultra-fast fibre optic services.
AsiaOne said that although many homes were able to use a wireless router in order to distribute signals to different rooms, signal interference and network slowdowns meant that this method was not suitable for data-rich uses like mioTV, a high-definition 24-hour TV pay television service that allows multimedia content to be viewed on any television set.
StarHub had said previously that it wanted to impose conditions on other companies wishing to access its networks, such as charging for supervised access, AsiaOne said.
