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Super-fast fibre broadband now ‘live’ in Weymouth


WEBWIRE

More than 19,000 local homes and businesses to benefit from BT’s £2.5 billion roll-out

High-speed fibre broadband is now available to homes and businesses in Weymouth, BT announced today.

About 9,000 Weymouth homes and business now have access to the sophisticated technology and this figure will increase to more than 19,000 premises as engineers complete the local investment in the coming weeks.

They follow other Dorset communities, such as Portland, Dorchester, Poole and Bournemouth where the high-speed technology is already available.

Sherborne, Lyme Regis and Swanage are among the Dorset communities also due to be upgraded later this year or early next year. By the end of Spring 2014 more than 250,000 Dorset homes and businesses - and about 1.5 million across the South West - will be able to benefit as a result of BT’s £2.5 billion fibre broadband roll-out programme.

The company is also working in partnership with the public sector to reach parts of the South West that lie outside its commercial fibre broadband plans.

Jon Reynolds, BT’s South West regional director, said: “The arrival of high-speed fibre broadband in Weymouth is the latest example of BT’s multi million pound investment in Dorset. It will provide a major boost for the local economy.

“Whatever you’re doing online, you can do it better and faster with fibre. It’s great for education, shopping, entertainment, the social networking we now carry out routinely online and it also offers huge benefits for businesses and public services.

“Fibre broadband can really help local firms in these economically challenging times, opening up new ways of working and speeding up vital operations, such as file and data transfers, conferencing and computer back-up, all of which may also help cut costs.”

BT’s fibre footprint currently passes more than 15 million UK homes and businesses. It is expanding all the time and is now due to pass two-thirds of UK premises – around 19 million premises – by the end of Spring 2014, at least 18 months ahead of the original timetable. 1

Jon Reynolds added: “Our ambition doesn’t stop with our commercial roll-out. We are keen to work with the public sector to find solutions for more challenging areas.”

Openreach, BT’s local network business, is primarily deploying fibre-to-the-cabinet (FTTC) technology, where the fibre runs from the exchange to a local roadside cabinet. FTTC offers download speeds of up to 80Mbps and upload speeds of up to 20Mbps 2 and could deliver even faster speeds in the future.

From Spring 2013 Openreach aims to start to make fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) technology, where the fibre runs all the way to the home or business, commercially available on demand 3 in areas where fibre broadband has been deployed. FTTP-on-demand will offer the top current download speed of 330Mbps 3. According to the regulator Ofcom, the current average UK broadband speed is 12Mbps.

At home, fibre broadband enables a family to simultaneously download a movie, watch a TV replay service, surf the internet and play games online all at the same time. A whole album can be downloaded in less than 30 seconds and a feature length HD movie in less than 10 minutes, whilst high-resolution photos can be uploaded to Facebook in seconds.

Unlike other companies, Openreach offers fibre broadband access to all service providers on an open, wholesale basis, underpinning a competitive market. For further information on Openreach’s fibre broadband programme visit www.superfast-openreach.co.uk


Notes to editors

1 BT’s deployment plans are subject to an acceptable environment for investment.

2 These are the top wholesale speeds available from Openreach to all service providers; speeds offered by service providers may vary.

3 Openreach will levy an installation charge for FTTP on demand. It will be up to service providers to decide whether they pass that on to businesses or consumers wishing to use the product.

Due to the current network topography, and the economics of deployment, it is likely that some premises within selected exchange areas will not initially be able to access fibre-based broadband. Openreach is considering alternative solutions for these locations.



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