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December 2, 2010

UK slow on the take up of fibre optic broadband

The take up of Superfast fibre broadband in the UK was at just 0.2% at the end of 2009 according to the latest Ofcom report.

However, 2010 has been an important year with regards to the UK and investment in Next Generation Broadband with BT starting the roll out of their own fibre network (BT Infinity) that by 2015 should cover around 66% of UK households. As tends to be the case when it comes to super fast broadband, Japan was leading the way with 34.4% of Japanese households using fibre broadband connections.

ofcom superfast broadband 2009 UK slow on the take up of fibre optic broadband

What the UK has seen increase at an huge rate is the take up of Smartphones with the year between January 2009 and January 2010 seeing smartphone take up rising by 70%, with 18 out of every 100 people now using a Smartphone. The place with the highest use of Smartphones (of the comparator European countries looked at for the study) is Italy with over a quarter of subscribers using a Smartphone.

Despite the UK being one of the places with the highest internet use via smartphones and mobile phones we are lagging behind hugely compared to other countries for the theoretical maximum mobile download speeds.

  • UK – 7.2Mbps
  • France – 7.2Mbps
  • Canada – 21Mbps
  • Spain – 21Mbps
  • Ireland – 21Mbps
  • Russia – 21Mbps
  • Germany – 28Mbps
  • Italy – 28Mbps
  • USA – 30Mbps
  • Japan – 42Mbps
  • Austria – 42Mbps
  • Poland – 42Mbps
  • Sweden – 100Mbps
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- Filed under: Fibre broadband,Mobile Broadband
- Tags: mobile broadband speeds, Next Generation Broadband, UK fibre broadband —
Author: Mark @ 11:35 am

July 15, 2010

Broadband Summit taking place to sort out UK broadband

A “Broadband summit” is taking place today in London, to talk about ways to get fast broadband out to every part of the UK.

A pledge to make Britain the fastest broadband nation in Europe by 2015 has also been made and that a minimum broadband speed of 2Mb should be available to every home in Britain.

However, the Government are not likely to be offering the broadband industry big pots of money to help fund the roll out, there is still the £175 million left over from the digital switchover that is to be used and since the government scrapped Labours 50p per month “broadband tax” that was to be used to help fund next generation broadband and the fact that as a country we have a huge deficit with money the government can’t afford to start spending.

BT are investing £2.5bn of their own money to fund the roll out of fibre broadband to two thirds of the UK, however they say that around £2bn more will be needed to reach the remaining third of the country. These remaining areas being areas where it is not financially viable for BT to fund the roll out themselves.

The CEO of BT Openreach, Steve Robertson said:

“As a society we need to make our minds up about what is an essential element of our social fabric. Today not having broadband makes people feel deprived.“

The Culture Secretary, Jeremy Hunt said:

“There is currently nothing to stop telecoms or utility companies reaching commercial agreements to share their infrastructure, but very few agreements currently exist.

Before we embark on legislation or start committing scarce public resources, we need to explore these cost-effective ways of achieving our aims so I want to hear from companies about their proposals and willingness to work towards mutually beneficial commercial arrangements.”

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- Filed under: Fibre broadband
- Tags: 2Mb minimum broadband, Fibre broadband, Next Generation Broadband, UK broadband —
Author: Ruth @ 10:10 am

May 18, 2010

New Broadband Minister to be appointed this week

The UK is to get a new Broadband Minister by the end of this week to be part of the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS).

Ed Vaizey, the Culture Minister is rumoured to be one of the likely candidates for the position. The position will be to make sure that the whole of the country is able to get a minimum 2Mb broadband connection by 2012 as part of the Universal Service Commitment and also to look at ways to get the remaining third of the country that won’t have next generation fibre broadband to be wired up to it.

BT announced last week that they were going to spend an extra £1 billion to roll out a fibre optic network to 66% of the UK making their total investment around £2.5 billion.

Labour had hoped to use a 50p per month Broadband Tax to help fun the roll out of next generation broadband to rural areas that were not in places where it made it financially viable for companies such as BT  or Virgin Media to roll out fibre to these places.
However, the Conservatives had planned before the election on using money from the Digital Switchover which is raised from the BBC License fee to help with the roll out of fibre optic networks, although this would not be available until after 2012.

This new position would keep broadband as an important issue and is one that we feel is a key part to the UK and it’s economy, it may involve some heavy investment but it would also help with the recovery of the economy.

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- Filed under: Fibre broadband,Home Broadband
- Tags: 2Mb minimum broadband, Broadband Minister, Next Generation Broadband —
Author: Mark @ 1:40 pm

March 15, 2010

Conservatives to bring 100Mb broadband to the UK if they win Election

If The Conservatives win the General Election they have pledged to deliver 100Mb fibre broadband across Britain by 2017.

Having just launched their “Technology Manifesto” it says that:

“We will be the first country in Europe to extend superfast 100 mbs broadband across most of the population. This is up to 50 times faster than Labour’s planned broadband network – and will open up new opportunities for the next generation of British high tech companies, and put Britain at an advantage when it comes to developing innovative online platforms and services.”

The wording above is a bit mis-leasding as they are comparing the minimum 2Mb Universal broadband that Labour have and not Labours aim of having 90% of the UK covered with Next Generation fibre broadband by 2017, which will be in part funded by the controversial 50p per month “broadband tax” that will be applied to every landline in the UK.

They would also hold BT to it’s word on requiring them to open up their ducts for other companies to lay their own fibre in them to houses where it is available and in return part of the BBC License fees would be used by BT to help deliver high speed broadband to more rural areas where the cost would be too high otherwise for BT to make it a commercially viable option.

The manifesto also read:

“Our plans will give Britain the fastest high speed broadband network in Europe, helping to create 600,000 additional jobs. We will make the British government the most technology-friendly in the world, and meet our ambition that the next generation of Googles, Microsofts and Facebooks are British companies”

It is good to see that with this election that technology and in-particularly high speed broadband is quite an important factor to it which we hope will result in the investment that is needed to make sure that Britain does rise up the ranks of high speed broadband nations instead of falling behind other advancing nations.
The General Election is widely anticipated to be on May 6th.

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- Filed under: Fibre broadband,Home Broadband
- Tags: 100Mb broadband, Conservatives Technology Manifesto, General Election 6th May 2010, Next Generation Broadband, Tories 100Mb broadband plans —
Author: Mark @ 12:28 pm

November 3, 2009

100,000 could give up Internet connections with the broadband tax

The TalkTalk chief executive, Charles Dunstone has estimated that around 100,000 lower income homes in the UK will have to give up their Internet connections due to the 50p per month/£6 per year broadband tax.

talktalk phone broadband 100,000 could give up Internet connections with the broadband taxThe broadband tax was proposed in the Digital Britain report earlier this year and due to last for 7 years with the aim of raising £1 billion to help with the investment of high speed fibre networks across the UK.

He also complained that private investors will also wait for the public handouts of money to invest in the fibre broadband networks in more rural areas as apposed to funding the development themselves.

Stephen Timms, the treasury minister is going to include this tax in this years finance bill meaning there is a good chance that it will be made legal before the next general election. The conservatives are hugely against the plans for the broadband tax, and with the Torries the favourite to come into power at the next general election it may be too late for them to get the plans scrapped.

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- Filed under: Home Broadband
- Tags: Broadband Tax, Digital Britain, Next Generation Broadband, TalkTalk appose broadband tax —
Author: Mark @ 12:06 am

September 25, 2009

£6 Broadband Tax could be law soon

The £6 “broadband tax” is set to be put through and made law before the next general election which will infuriate many who think that it would not get passed under a Conservative government (the favourites to win the next general election).

Stephen Timms who is the Treasury minister said that the £6 per year tax on phone lines should be made law in the next few months as it could be put forward in the Digital Economy Bill that is due to be put before the House in November or it could be part of the Finance Bill that would be presented after the budget.

The 50p per month charge on all telephone lines is expected to raise around £175 million per year and is to be used to help pay for next generation super fast fibre broadband even thought there are serious doubts that the money raised will come anywhere close to help fund it.

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- Filed under: News
- Tags: Broadband Tax, Digital Britain, Fibre broadband, Next Generation Broadband —
Author: Mark @ 9:43 am


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