Internet penetration in Singapore

Not sure if we are boarding the optic fibre internet bandwagon late, we are finally having fibre optic cables for internet.
How cool is that?
However, incumbents like Singtel and Starhub have yet to do anything on the pricing of the internet via the broadband telephone line. The rival is still pegged at a very high cost due to the overheads of installing the cables.
Surely, we can visualise the future?
There will be a time where the internet is about instant, for work, play, leisure and family.
It will be information at the fingertips.
How cool is that?
Think of the endless possibilities.
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Singapore’s Next Generation Nationwide Broadband Network (Next Gen NBN) has reached a new milestone.
According to The Straits Times, 60 per cent of all homes and buildings in the island have been equipped with the state-of-the-art ultra high-speed optical fibre network, which allows users to surf the Internet up to 100 times faster than they could with conventional broadband plans, and achieving higher connection speeds of 1 Gbps and above will become a reality for many.
The scheme, a collaboration between Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA) and OpenNet, is under the Intelligent National 2015 (iN2015) masterplan by IDA. It kicked off in 2009, with OpenNet reaching the first home in August 2009, and is on track to reach 95 per cent by the middle of next year despite delays faced due to the initial reluctance by condominiums to be wired.
The project took a standstill in November last year when as many as nine in 10 condominiums refused to be connected, mainly due to aesthetic concerns.
OpenNet wanted to lay the cables via boxy plastic piping on wall surfaces, similar to what they did in HDB flats.
However, many condominiums insisted on having the cables hidden within walls or false ceilings, which is more expensive, and neither they nor OpenNet were willing to foot the bill.
It went smoothly only when the Government intervened, releasing a statement saying that all condominiums are required to allow the installation of the fibre-optic cabling needed for the network, and those who failed to do so would be fined up to S$1,000 a day.
The resistance put up by condominiums could potentially cut off 20 per cent of Singapore’s one million households from the network.
Commercial broadband plans served by the billion-dollar broadband network have yet to be offered by broadband service providers such as SingTel and StarHub, but the cost to sign on to the ultra high-speed broadband is one big factor among consumers.
“I think you will see cost coming down over time. Obviously it will be a competitive market, I don’t want to announce what our prices will be yet,” Neil Montefiore, StarHub’s CEO told ChannelNewsAsia.
Singapore is currently ranked #15 in Speedtest.net’s list of “Top Countries Ranked by Speed” with an average download speed of 16.23 Mbps while Asian neighbour South Korea tops the list at 39.22 Mbps.
In the hyper-connected country, more than 94 per cent of South Koreans have high-speed connections, according to a report published by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) while the Internet penetration rate here stands at 72.4 per cent, according to InternetWorldStats.