Which Network is the best Flow or Digicel

[Brandysull]

I thought I would have seen a comment regarding Digicel's new awards. The mobile one was surprising considering Brandysull usually has stats to say why FLOW is faster.

https://www.speedtest.net/awards/jamaica/

Not exactly surprising... The utilization, in comparison to their equal share of spectrum assets, is quite high on the FLOW side. Throughput has taken quite a hit thanks to the unlimited fare that they now offer. The fixed tests are a bit more interesting. FLOW seems to have bested Digicel's fixed speeds by about 2 Mbit/s. Digicel, however, eviscerates them in the upload -- to the tune of 50 Mbit/s vs ~10 Mbit/s from FLOW. I sincerely wished Digicel had invested in an islandwide fixed broadband business.

FLOW needs the competition, desperately.

[psilos]

Also don't forget that Digicel can turn up the 50 Mbit download or upload on a dime, that is just the most cost effective for most people. Unfortunately Digicel just could not afford the islandwide fixed broadband rollout. Fibre just costs too much and you will see that all around the world especially the US. Europe bit the bullet and early and just sucked up the cost and now reaping the benefits.

FLOW "could" invest in their HFC and resolve all the uptime, contention issues but upload has always been a problem for HFC and DOCSIS. I always look to the Comcast as the HFC leader and they are still only offering 35Mbps on their offerings outside of their symmetric 1Gbps offerings which are FTTH.

Just yesterday they announced 1Gbps/1Gbps over cable so I guess that will be available in 2-3yrs and in Jamaica maybe 6?

[Brandysull]

Also don't forget that Digicel can turn up the 50 Mbit download or upload on a dime, that is just the most cost effective for most people. Unfortunately Digicel just could not afford the islandwide fixed broadband rollout. Fibre just costs too much and you will see that all around the world especially the US. Europe bit the bullet and early and just sucked up the cost and now reaping the benefits.

FLOW "could" invest in their HFC and resolve all the uptime, contention issues but upload has always been a problem for HFC and DOCSIS. I always look to the Comcast as the HFC leader and they are still only offering 35Mbps on their offerings outside of their symmetric 1Gbps offerings which are FTTH.

Just yesterday they announced 1Gbps/1Gbps over cable so I guess that will be available in 2-3yrs and in Jamaica maybe 6?

Frankly, I have a number of issues with Digicel -- not least of which is the half-heartedness of their 360-telecoms-play intentions. Columbus came and built-out an islandwide fibre network to the point where areas (like Mobay) not only have HFC but also have fibre overbuild. FLOW (now) recently announced their partial conversion of one area (Bogue) to FTTH, from HFC. I'm under no illusions that the cost to Columbus must have been tremendous and hence made the move to HFC the most cost-effective. However, thanks to several M&As with regional cable players in Jamaica, FLOW grew and built a network that now serves 60% of Jamaica's broadband subscriber base (~40% of which are on HFC). I don't think Digicel is all that serious about capturing market share. Their cost per megabit is extortive & far less competitive (price-wise) than FLOW (which has been speaking of upgrades to faster speeds coming). If the competition makes good on their intention to go full-fibre in 3 years, what will be the USP for a Digicel Home Fibre in 2023? How will they compete against a converged player pushing the majority of Jamaica's traffic if they don't plan to build out to other areas now?

Quick point, Liberty Latin America is a part of the industry research team behind DOCSIS 3.1 & 4.0. I don't doubt we'll be seeing 250-500 Mbit/s as the norm here very soon.

[khat17]

I've spoken on this before in as plain terms as I could. Let me go over it agian.

FLOW has the better network overall. They're a bigger company with deeper pockets. They also have better overall infrastructure.

If you're talking about DATA then bear in mind that Digicel buys from FLOW. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong - and I may be since I've not done any recent checks - but FLOW has fiber going out of the country. Anyone else providing connectivity has to either go through FLOW or go with some satellite connection.

If you're talking about MOBILE then it's a bit of a toss up from the consumer side. Signal penetration based on radio saturation is something I can't speak to. In the past Digicel had far better radio handover. Nowadays it's really not any better with either provider. I think in my last few posts I had gone between both at different times for call/data on the road. Currently (as of this post - 2020-10-10) I wouldn't recommend either one for CALLS. For general DATA usage while on the road, Digicel is better. I've had cases now with FLOW showing LTE but being unable to browse, or showing H+ and not able to browse. On H+ if you disable/enable data it will magically go up to LTE and browse quite fine. I'm finding that FLOW isn't browsing nowadays without being on LTE - unlike in the past where it would browse even on EDGE. I can bring up my previous Portland trip where FLOW had EDGE and Digicel had H+ but FLOW was still browsing faster on EDGE.

Usage experience will be based on whether you travel around the country a lot or only within a set number of parishes/areas. My current recommendation for DATA is Digicel for usage. FLOW has better overall call plans and their data plans also seem better - but Digicel manages data better.

[BNOVA]

I've spoken on this before in as plain terms as I could. Let me go over it agian.

FLOW has the better network overall. They're a bigger company with deeper pockets. They also have better overall infrastructure.

If you're talking about DATA then bear in mind that Digicel buys from FLOW. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong - and I may be since I've not done any recent checks - but FLOW has fiber going out of the country. Anyone else providing connectivity has to either go through FLOW or go with some satellite connection.

I am not sure who Digicel buys Internet from but your likely right that it is Flow or one of the associated companies.
Columbus Communications had its fiber ring (Probably more than 2) in the Caribbean and Lime had two as well before the merger so now they more than likely have 4 combined at least if things remained the same.

I know Digicel does not have ring as they cannot afford to build one our due to financial issues they are having and hence why their island wide deployment is not moving as fast. They burned through alot of funds just to be where they are now and they under estimated demand.

[BNOVA]

Frankly, I have a number of issues with Digicel -- not least of which is the half-heartedness of their 360-telecoms-play intentions. Columbus came and built-out an islandwide fibre network to the point where areas (like Mobay) not only have HFC but also have fibre overbuild. FLOW (now) recently announced their partial conversion of one area (Bogue) to FTTH, from HFC. I'm under no illusions that the cost to Columbus must have been tremendous and hence made the move to HFC the most cost-effective. However, thanks to several M&As with regional cable players in Jamaica, FLOW grew and built a network that now serves 60% of Jamaica's broadband subscriber base (~40% of which are on HFC). I don't think Digicel is all that serious about capturing market share. Their cost per megabit is extortive & far less competitive (price-wise) than FLOW (which has been speaking of upgrades to faster speeds coming). If the competition makes good on their intention to go full-fibre in 3 years, what will be the USP for a Digicel Home Fibre in 2023? How will they compete against a converged player pushing the majority of Jamaica's traffic if they don't plan to build out to other areas now?

Quick point, Liberty Latin America is a part of the industry research team behind DOCSIS 3.1 & 4.0. I don't doubt we'll be seeing 250-500 Mbit/s as the norm here very soon.

Yes Columbus Communications went HFC with the aim to mode to a Fiber solution for residential customers once they were able to do so as a fiber build out is costly and the average Jamaican could not manage the installation cost.

[leoandru]

I am not sure who Digicel buys Internet from but your likely right that it is Flow or one of the associated companies.
Columbus Communications had its fiber ring (Probably more than 2) in the Caribbean and Lime had two as well before the merger so now they more than likely have 4 combined at least if things remained the same.

I know Digicel does not have ring as they cannot afford to build one our due to financial issues they are having and hence why their island wide deployment is not moving as fast. They burned through alot of funds just to be where they are now and they under estimated demand.

They have a map of their network https://www.cwnetworks.com/ the interactive version gives more information, capacity, etc https://www.cwnetworks.com/webapp/webapp/#/

AS for Digicel, they have a big stake in Deep blue cable, should have landed in Jamaica in 2020 but no one seems to know what is happening with that anymore. Even their website looks erroneous

[BNOVA]

They have a map of their network https://www.cwnetworks.com/ the interactive version gives more information, capacity, etc https://www.cwnetworks.com/webapp/webapp/#/

AS for Digicel, they have a big stake in Deep blue cable, should have landed in Jamaica in 2020 but no one seems to know what is happening with that anymore. Even their website looks erroneous

Thanks. I know about that ring diagram but it does not show everything.

As for the Deep Blue Cable I have not heard anything further about it as well. It seems they are having issues as the Twitter page has not had an update since May last year.

[psilos]

They have a map of their network https://www.cwnetworks.com/ the interactive version gives more information, capacity, etc https://www.cwnetworks.com/webapp/webapp/#/

AS for Digicel, they have a big stake in Deep blue cable, should have landed in Jamaica in 2020 but no one seems to know what is happening with that anymore. Even their website looks erroneous

If you look at the "new" website you will see that is completely unrelated to the previous party (content, logo, contact us, etc). Unfortunately it appears that company is no more. Even the former CEO no longer works there.