Lidl, a German discount supermarket – think Walmart type operation – is going to start selling discount broadband packages soon. The company plans to offer high speed connections for about 20 Euros a month. They will also sell a VoIP-based phone service as well. They won’t be the first super market chain to get into the Internet access business – a British supermarket company used to give away free dial-up connections in the early days of commercial Internet.

More recently, UK-based mobile phone retail chain, Carphone Warehouse getting into the broadband access business. The markets in Europe are highly competitive mostly because of governments are pressuring the incumbents to open up. In comparison, we in the states have little or no competition.