What Does “Fibre Fast” Mean?
“Fibre-fast” is a popular term across the fixed-line industry.
Openreach and BT announced their deployment of Gigabit capable FTTP (Fibre-To-The-Premises) technology has been installed in millions of UK homes.
The below map provides some insight into the Openreach role-out across East London. See the key for information.
Since the fibre-fast project began in February 2018, engineers have deployed around 6 million kilometres of optical fibre.
The massive engineering project has also involved a dedicated team of around 2,000 fibre engineers, using hundreds of heavy plant machinery, pole erection units, cherry pickers, mini-diggers, 3000 spades and a small fleet of drones.
The overall target was to reach 3 million premises by the end of 2020, which wasn’t achieved, but their target of 10 million by 2025 could be reached, with the rapid rise in recruitment.
In order to celebrate the progress so far, Openreach gifted the one millionth home (Shaun Duffield’s family of 8 children in Leeds) with free “full fibre” broadband for a year (selected at random from the most recent batch of fibre enabled premises).
Clive Selley, Openreach CEO said: “Our full fibre build is speeding ahead and we’re now ready to connect more than a million consumers and businesses if they decide to order from a service provider that’s using our FTTP network. Since the launch of our build programme last year we’ve made huge progress – honing our skills, tools and techniques, driving our costs down and helping our engineers to go ever further, faster and more efficiently. Last month we announced plans for Salisbury to become the first entire city in the country to have access to our FTTP network – in what is expected to be the fastest city-wide network build in the UK. But it’s not all about being a fast builder, we’re also keen to encourage fast adoption. We recently launched a consultation with industry to decide how and when we upgrade customers to this new future-proofed digital network. Ultimately our ambition is to deliver the best possible digital connectivity to everyone, everywhere, across the entire country. I believe the progress we have made to date proves that we’re making good on that promise, but there’s more to do. One of this would be possible without our engineering workforce – which is why it is fantastic to see so many new people wanting to join the country’s largest team of telecoms experts working to expand, upgrade, maintain and install services over Openreach’s national broadband network.”
This effort will help the Government to achieve their current target of supporting FTTP networks to cover 10 million UK premises by 2026, then 15 million by the end of 2028 and they also have an ambition to see a “nationwide full-fibre” network by 2035.
This will of course involve input from many alternative network ISPs and not just Openreach.
Margot James, ex Minister for Digital, said “The Future Telecoms Infrastructure Review set out our approach to maximising full fibre coverage, and I’m delighted that Openreach has now reached one million homes and businesses. Significant investment like this from network operators is critical to deliver our plans for nationwide coverage, and we’re working with industry and Ofcom to create an environment that supports and encourages the commercial rollout of full fibre broadband.”