Openreach is planning to make ultrafast broadband available in 27 market towns and villages across the South West.
It’s part of a bigger announcement involving 227 ‘harder to reach’ areas across the 海角视频, with building to start in the next 14 months.
It’s part of Openreach’s previously stated target to reach four million homes and businesses with ‘full fibre’ technology by the end of March 2021.
These new locations across Cornwall, Devon, Torbay, Dorset and Somerset are part of the company’s ambition to extend its new ‘full’ fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) network outside cities.
The work builds on successful cost busting village trials launched at the tail end of last year which have seen engineers developing a range of new tools, skills and techniques to help Openreach build full fibre in areas previously considered too complex or expensive to upgrade.
Matthew Galley, Openreach’s Partnership Director in the West of England, said: “This is great news for people living and working here and builds on Openreach’s strong track record of working in rural areas, for years playing a key role alongside local councils to upgrade nearly 95 per cent of the South West of England to superfast broadband.
"Today’s announcement is about taking that next step and building a full fibre network that is not only faster, but also more reliable and future-proof for generations to come.”
Anthony Mangnall, Member of Parliament for Totnes said, “I am very pleased that Openreach has launched this full fibre programme to connect ‘harder to reach areas’. The South West’s digital connectivity is far behind the rest of the country and I hope today’s announcement will see greater connectivity between our communities and guarantee increased accessibility to our region. I particularly welcome the news that this programme will focus on Brixham, Higher Brixham, Copythorne and Furzeham.”
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A report by the Centre for Economics & Business Research commissioned by Openreach in 2019 revealed that connecting everyone in the South West of England to ‘full fibre’ broadband by 2025 would create a £4.3 billion boost to the region’s economy.
The report also revealed that 42,000 people in the region could be brought back into the workforce through enhanced connectivity. This could include roles within small businesses and entrepreneurs – as well as allowing thousands more people to work remotely., by unlocking smarter ways of working, better public services and greater opportunities for the next-generation of home-grown businesses.
Openreach’s CEO, Clive Selley, said: “Our full fibre build program is going great guns - having passed over 2 million premises already on the way to our 4m target by March 2021. We’re now building at around 26,000 premises a week in over 100 locations – reaching a new home or business every 23 seconds That’s up from 13,000 premises a week this time last year.
“Openreach has always been committed to doing our bit in rural Britain - delivering network upgrades in communities that are harder to reach and less densely populated. We intend to build a significant portion of our full-fibre network in these harder to reach areas of the 海角视频 and are announcing 227 locations today.
“Our ambition is to reach 15 million premises by mid-2020s if right investment conditions are in place. Currently, the biggest missing piece of this puzzle is getting an exemption from business rates on building fibre cables which is critical for any fibre builder’s long-term investment case.”
The 27 locations being announced in the South West are:
Devon – 13 locations (with 4 in Torbay) including Brixham, Higher Brixham, Copythorne,
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Furzeham, Buckfastleigh, Budleigh Salterton, Knowle, Chudleigh, Colaton Raleigh, Newton
Poppleford, Tavistock, Lamerton, Tiverton
Cornwall – 5 locations including Camelford, Liskeard, St Keyne, St Cleer, Menheniot
Dorset – 5 locations including: Beaminster, Gillingham, Shaftesbury, Motcombe, Verwood;
Somerset – 4 locations including Cheddar, Draycott, Stratton-on-the-Fosse, Wrington.