In this paper, we document how public funds, or State Aid, have been used to support the deployment of broadband infrastructure in Europe since 2003. Our descriptive analysis relies on a unique data set on all the broadband measures notified to the European Commission by Member States between 2003 and 2018. We identify two waves of State Aid for broadband: one for the deployment of basic broadband, and a more recent one for the roll out of next-generation access networks. The use of State Aid is very heterogeneous across Member States, with a few large countries representing the bulk of the cases. The objective of most plans is to expand broadband coverage. The typical project relies mainly on public funds, and involves a direct grant, an open tender, and a contract for 3–5 years. Access obligations are imposed on networks deployed with State Aid, using a benchmarking approach in most cases. Finally, we show that notifications are associated with a relatively high level of broadband coverage in notifying countries, suggesting that public investment is taking over from private investment.

中文翻译：

---

评估欧盟 15 年的宽带国家援助：定量分析

在本文中，我们记录了自 2003 年以来公共资金或国家援助如何用于支持欧洲宽带基础设施的部署。我们的描述性分析依赖于成员通知欧盟委员会的所有宽带措施的独特数据集2003 年至 2018 年之间的国家。我们确定了两波国家宽带援助浪潮：一波用于部署基本宽带，另一波用于推出下一代接入网络。成员国之间国家援助的使用情况非常不同，少数几个大国代表了大部分案例。大多数计划的目标是扩大宽带覆盖范围。典型项目主要依靠公共资金，涉及直接拨款、公开招标和3-5年的合同。对使用国家援助部署的网络施加访问义务，在大多数情况下使用基准测试方法。最后，我们表明通知与通知国家的相对较高的宽带覆盖水平有关，这表明公共投资正在取代私人投资。