|
 daslog
join:2002-04-10 Milford, NH
| Re: $15,000 to wire a 23 floor office building I guess it really depends on how much profit they make per customer. For example, if it costs them 5,000 grand to wire 10 houses and they only make 10 bucks a month profit per house, then it's going to take 4+ years for Comcast to break even.
On the other hand, if they make 20 bucks a month profit per sub, then it's only 2 years to make back their initial investment. | |
|
 |  RayW Premium join:2001-09-01 Layton, UT clubs:
·XMission
| Re: $15,000 to wire a 23 floor office building said by daslog : For example, if it costs them 5,000 grand to wire 10 houses a Do you mean 5 million or 5 thousand? -- I am not lost, I find myself every time. | |
|
 |   cdru Go Colts Premium,MVM join:2003-05-14 Fort Wayne, IN
| said by daslog :I guess it really depends on how much profit they make per customer. For example, if it costs them 5,000 grand to wire 10 houses and they only make 10 bucks a month profit per house, then it's going to take 4+ years for Comcast to break even. A year ago Verizon happily wired my neighborhood with FiOS. At the time I believe the price tag was somewhere around $1500 per house. I pay $40/month to Verizon for my data online line. At at price it will take 3 years for Verizon to recoup that install cost, and that was with 100% of my payment going to pay for the install. If you figure $10/month (still probably high) it will take over 12 years to recoup the cost.
Comcast has the exact same line buried in my backyard as they did 27 years ago when they built my addition. They have had plenty of time to recoup the initial install costs over that 27 year period. The thought that it might take them 5 or 10 years to recoup the costs shouldn't even be an issue. -- Quis custodiet custodes ipsos? | |
|
 |  |  daslog
join:2002-04-10 Milford, NH | Re: $15,000 to wire a 23 floor office building "The thought that it might take them 5 or 10 years to recoup the costs shouldn't even be an issue."
Don't tell their stockholders that. Taking losses isn't good for your stock price.. | |
|
 |  |  |   cdru Go Colts Premium,MVM join:2003-05-14 Fort Wayne, IN
| Re: $15,000 to wire a 23 floor office building said by daslog :Don't tell their stockholdersdaytraders that. Taking losses isn't good for your stock price.. Don't count daytraders that are looking for instant profits. Look at the long term stockholders that really count. If the telco/cableco really were concerned about making the "quick buck" instead of long term investments, they would have never switched to fiber or hybrid fiber/coax networks. -- Quis custodiet custodes ipsos? | |
|
 |  |  |  |   MadMANN Premium join:2005-08-19
·Comcast
| Re: $15,000 to wire a 23 floor office building I can guarantee that a customer in the boones about 1000 feet away from the closest fiber run with no other houses for another couple thousand feet would be charged to bring service to their home. If it costs $15,000 in time and material, a $40-60 /month income is NOT worth it. If you think it is, then you can loan me $15,000 cash and I'll gladly give you $60 month until it's paid off.
In your situation, I am sure Verizon happily wired you and dozens of surrounding homes. It's a different story than three to five houses within a mile stretch.
This news article doesn't even provide that info as to the specifics of how far they had to run the plant and what equipment they needed to do it.
I did a site audit one time for a house that was 600 feet off of the road. I drew up a map and cited the specifics about the job. It wasn't a difficult run. There was an usused splitter port on the plant. They ran feeder to the house and we installed RG11 from the new tap to the house. Total install costs to the company = appx $2000. And the customer got free installation with $20/ month internet with $30/ month digital for 6 months. What did they do? They canceled in 6 months and went back to dial up and satellite. I went back there 2 weeks ago (about 5 months after they cancelled) and reinstalled the internet. When I asked them why they switched back to satellite? "There is no contract with cable and Directv was offering another special. We just put it under our wife's name. I do really miss channel x,y & z, though. And Directv is pissing me off with their screwy billing. I'll switch back again after my contract is up with them."  | |
|
 |  |  |  |  |   cdru Go Colts Premium,MVM join:2003-05-14 Fort Wayne, IN
| Re: $15,000 to wire a 23 floor office building said by MadMANN :I can guarantee that a customer in the boones about 1000 feet away from the closest fiber run with no other houses for another couple thousand feet would be charged to bring service to their home. If it costs $15,000 in time and material, a $40-60 /month income is NOT worth it. If you think it is, then you can loan me $15,000 cash and I'll gladly give you $60 month until it's paid off. In your situation, I am sure Verizon happily wired you and dozens of surrounding homes. It's a different story than three to five houses within a mile stretch. I'm not saying that it's the same situation. But they are wiring up an area based on a central office. They aren't going to light up an entire area but leave a few houses that are 1/4 mile away. Yes it does cost more for wiring up those farther houses. But the return isn't just in revenue on a monthly basis. It's less copper that they have to maintain. They can eliminate older equipment in the CO. They can advance their network and potentially get additional revenue that they didn't before as those people out in the boonies probably weren't getting DSL and now they can get FiOS data and video. The $1500 that it costs when FiOS was installed for me wasn't the exact cost for me. It was the average cost for the area. It factored in densly populated neighborhoods where a mile stretch of fiber could serve dozens of houses. It also factors in the fringes of my town where there may be 6 or 8 houses in a mile strech.
This news article doesn't even provide that info as to the specifics of how far they had to run the plant and what equipment they needed to do it. I wasn't replying in response to the news article. My original reply was in response to daslog 's post where he was questioning the capitalization of the installation over 4 years. The capitalization of that buried (or aerial run) is much longer then just 4 years. If the telcos and cablecos wanted very short term returns on their investments then new installations would not happen ANYWHERE. You just can't make a return that quickly.
I would agree though that the articles were sparse in the information. In some cases I'm sure the companies do quote a unreasonably high number just because they don't want to deal with installing a relatively few customers. But in other times I think they are quoting reasonable prices. It's all in the details.
I did a site audit one time for a house that was 600 feet off of the road. I drew up a map and cited the specifics about the job. It wasn't a difficult run. There was an usused splitter port on the plant. They ran feeder to the house and we installed RG11 from the new tap to the house. Total install costs to the company = appx $2000. And the customer got free installation with $20/ month internet with $30/ month digital for 6 months. What did they do? They canceled in 6 months and went back to dial up and satellite. I went back there 2 weeks ago (about 5 months after they cancelled) and reinstalled the internet. When I asked them why they switched back to satellite? "There is no contract with cable and Directv was offering another special. We just put it under our wife's name. I do really miss channel x,y & z, though. And Directv is pissing me off with their screwy billing. I'll switch back again after my contract is up with them."  And that is the risk any company takes with any type of investment. My company takes a risk when they train me and hope that I stick around to make the training worth the cost. But I could leave and they lose the investment. Razor blade companies hope that you keep buying blades for their razor so that they recoup the cost of the handles. But I could throw it away and go with the competition's razor. In the case of the $2000 install where the customer left, a few months later when they came back you were able to reuse the cable right? So the cable company can still capitalize on the initial investment. It just will take longer to recoup the cost. But over the entire cable plant, things average out. -- Quis custodiet custodes ipsos? | |
|
 |  |  Nuts
join:2006-04-27 Forest, OH 1 edit | True, but if you add in video and phone onto that piece of fiber, then their roi will be lower.
Edit: Also, to the best of my knowledge, Verizon don't have to allow other competitors to use the fiber they're laying. | |
|
 |  |   atuarre Here come the drums Premium join:2004-02-14 Lake Charles, LA clubs: 
| said by cdru :said by daslog :I guess it really depends on how much profit they make per customer. For example, if it costs them 5,000 grand to wire 10 houses and they only make 10 bucks a month profit per house, then it's going to take 4+ years for Comcast to break even. A year ago Verizon happily wired my neighborhood with FiOS. At the time I believe the price tag was somewhere around $1500 per house. I pay $40/month to Verizon for my data online line. At at price it will take 3 years for Verizon to recoup that install cost, and that was with 100% of my payment going to pay for the install. If you figure $10/month (still probably high) it will take over 12 years to recoup the cost. Comcast has the exact same line buried in my backyard as they did 27 years ago when they built my addition. They have had plenty of time to recoup the initial install costs over that 27 year period. The thought that it might take them 5 or 10 years to recoup the costs shouldn't even be an issue. And it is issues like that which is causing Verizon a big headache with it's shareholders. They are dumping all this money in FIOS but are not seeing the return on their investment right now. | |
|
  RustyTheDog Premium join:2003-05-27 Trenton, NJ
·Sprint Mobile Broa..
| said by morbo :Periodicially, Charter offers to wire my work building for about $15,000. The management company always throws the option to tenants to have the cost split among everyone, but it never is approved. There is just something wrong about PAYING the cable company to wire your space so that you can then PAY them for service. It the cable company wants my business, they will wire the building--NOT ask me to do it for them. But you're comparing getting a wire to the door of your building to wiring the entire building, right? I can't imagine there is a cable company out there that would wire your entire building for free. Although I do agree that paying the cable company for the work seems a bit redundant. Why don't you see if a local electrician or someone else would be interested. The cable company doesn't have to do it. | |
|
 |   c0de
join:2004-10-14 Richmond, VA | Re: $15,000 to wire a 23 floor office building I was about to say the same thing, I am sure that you could find an electrician to do it for you for less. | |
|
 |  |   John Galt Forward, March Premium join:2004-09-30 Happy Camp
·CenturyLink
| Re: $15,000 to wire a 23 floor office building said by c0de :I was about to say the same thing, I am sure that you could find an electrician to do it for you for less. Obviously you don't know much about it... -- A is A | |
|
 |  |  |  zentec
join:2002-01-05 Monroe, MI | Re: $15,000 to wire a 23 floor office building Given the efficiencies of an electrician over the cable-jockeys that Charter employs, I'd say a three man crew of good electricians would end up being cheaper. | |
|
 |  |  |  |  |
 |  |  |  |  |  averagedude
join:2002-01-30 Mesa, AZ
·Cox HSI
| Re: $15,000 to wire a 23 floor office building I think there are 2 distinct point be said that are being mixed.
1. Service to the property line. 2. service with in the property line.
Service to the property should fall on the provider. To be fair, if the property is in the middle of nowhere with absolutely no way of spreading the cost to other owners which basically ends up being a dedicated circuit.....but most of these posts refer to less than several hundred yards to service their property.
Service with in the property line should fall on the owner unless there is an agreement of "right of way." | |
|
 |  |  |  |  |  |   John Galt Forward, March Premium join:2004-09-30 Happy Camp
·CenturyLink
| Re: $15,000 to wire a 23 floor office building said by averagedude :Service with in the property line should fall on the owner unless there is an agreement of "right of way." Cable companies will do premise wiring in large buildings...they just want to get paid for it up front.
Hence the $15,000 quote... -- A is A | |
|
 |  |  |  |  |
 |   GT
| Well you pay the electrician to wire your house, then you pay the electric company to give you the power. same thing with cable companies. you pay them to do the wiring then they send the juice down the line for your services. | |
|
 |  |   John Galt Forward, March Premium join:2004-09-30 Happy Camp
·CenturyLink
| Re: $15,000 to wire a 23 floor office building said by GT :
Well you pay the electrician to wire your house, then you pay the electric company to give you the power. same thing with cable companies. you pay them to do the wiring then they send the juice down the line for your services. Oh noes...!! -- A is A | |
|
 |   battleop
join:2005-09-28 00000
| We do it all the time. There are office buildings in our area where you can't get DSL and Comcast wants to charge the landlords thousands to bring in cable. The land lords just want some broadband in their buildings to keep tenants from moving to places where they can get cable or dsl.
So what we do is come in with some T1s multi linked, install a switch I can create some vLans in and drop ethernet to the tenants. Most of the time comcast wants 10 to 20k to wire out the buildings with no revenue share to the land lord. We tell the land lord we bare the expense and they are our customers. Landlords are happy to do this, all they want is broadband for their tenants. | |
|
 averagedude
join:2002-01-30 Mesa, AZ
·Cox HSI
| said by morbo :There is just something wrong about PAYING the cable company to wire your space so that you can then PAY them for service. Agreed! | |
|
 markopoleo
join:2003-04-02 Bonne Terre, MO | I'm sure you did, but you consider wiring it yourself for cheaper? If you don't own the building ask the landlord about at least fronting part of it. Find it odd that it was not wired for cable to begin with, guess a older building? | |
|
  asdfasdfcxvcvcvc
@hickorytech.net | Why should they wire up your building for free? Once it's installed it's you're wiring, even if charter or whoever paid for it to be done. You could have them wire up the building for free and then everyone could switch to another company. | |
|
  GlobalMind Domino Dude, POWER Systems Guy Premium join:2001-10-29 Hollywood, FL
| said by morbo :Periodicially, Charter offers to wire my work building for about $15,000. The management company always throws the option to tenants to have the cost split among everyone, but it never is approved. There is just something wrong about PAYING the cable company to wire your space so that you can then PAY them for service. It the cable company wants my business, they will wire the building--NOT ask me to do it for them. Well are they quoting for wiring the inside of the building (all floors, rooms etc) or are they just talking cabling up to a demarc outside the building?
I don't see how a provider is obligated to wire the inside premise of your facility or home at no cost. I think (assuming regulatory mandates) they would be obligated to run up to the outside, but that's it. The building management & thus tenants would end up paying someone to do those inside runs which could be Charter or some other contractor.
Full wire-up of 23 floors is going to be costly no matter who does it.
K. -- Race season is over, now what?!? | TheGlobalMind.com | Speed costs money. How fast do you want to go? | Angus the IT Chap | |
|
 |   morbo Complete Your Transaction
join:2002-01-22 00000 clubs: | Re: $15,000 to wire a 23 floor office building My problem with this type of situation is that it is basically off-loading the infastructure investment onto the consumers. A lousy tactic, in my opinion. | |
|
 |
|
 |