What are the Public Benefits of Open Access? Evaluating the Social Cost and Benefits of Municipal Fibre Networks

The project is focused on examining the incentives generated by public-private partnerships (PPP) for private investment in next-generation access networks. The leading example of a PPP in the Netherlands has been the Glasvezelnetwerk (GVA) Amsterdam where the municipality, social housing corporations and private firms jointly own the network (Model: City network).

The University of Ghent will look at he development of a cost-benefit model for the rollout of municipality networks, taking into account the socio-economic benefits. Extended evaluation techniques such as multi-actor analysis with strong focus on cost and risk allocation, and real options analysis will be considered for indicating the sustainability of the rollout models.