Millrose’s Post

Parts of rural Wales can now benefit from fast and reliable mobile coverage helping to boost economic growth and bridge the digital divide in remote areas. The first of 86 UK government-funded 4G masts have been switched on as part of joint plan with telecoms firms to deliver mobile connectivity across 95 per cent of the UK landmass. Existing masts have been upgraded to deliver 4G cover while limiting the visual impact of the programme, delivering on the Government’s long term plan. https://lnkd.in/eub-Y3mS

Government’s plans to extend #4G mobile connectivity in rural areas are running behind schedule, according to a new UK National Audit Office report, 'Supporting mobile connectivity' - it focuses on the Shared Rural Network programme, funded by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) and the UK’s four mobile network operators – EE, Three UK, Virgin Media O2 and Vodafone It is aimed at achieving 95% 4G coverage across the UK landmass by December 2025, up from 91.4% when the programme launched in March 2020; but by autumn 2023 coverage had reached 92.7% and only EE had reached its interim target - making it 'unclear' that the programme will meet the 95% target on time. https://lnkd.in/eCuVJkYq

For the past few years, we’ve all read about the big 3 mobile operators competing against incumbent broadband providers for a piece of the $1 billion home broadband market. This week, Light Reading senior editor Jeff Baumgartner covers how rural operators are using their fixed wireless access networks to “edge-in” to urban markets to compete for their share of the #FWA pie. Speaking on a Light Reading – Society of Cable Telecommunications Engineers webinar, Nextlink Internet CEO Bill Baker explained that FWA costs are low and unlike fiber, FWA deployments into urban regions “don’t need 30 to 40% market share for it to make sense financially. They need 2%, 1.5%...it’s a totally different ballgame economically on the fixed wireless side.” Pivotal’s take? There’s plenty of FWA broadband demand to go around for all wireless providers. Welcome to the FWA party, rural colleagues! Read Jeff’s article here: https://bit.ly/4atODbl #5G #mmWave

96% of properties could receive full fibre broadband by 2027, according to Ofcom's latest Planned Network Deployments report. If all build plans are realised as expected, the UK telecoms regulator also forecasts  gigabit-capable networks could increase from 85% to 99% in urban areas and 49% to 88% in rural areas by the same year. Catch more findings via Comms Business: #FTTP #FTTX #FullFibre #GigabitBritain #Connectivity  https://lnkd.in/ep5F6V4j

Canada and Italy had some of the slowest broadband growth and, in some cases, a reversal of adoption based on a decline in cable and copper connections. The United States didn't log a loss, but the data wasn't pretty for American broadband companies, either. #broadband #fixedwireless #fwa #bead

Ofcom Predict 98 Percent of UK Covered by Gigabit Broadband in May 2027 The UK telecoms regulator, Ofcom, has published the third edition of their forecast for Planned Network Deployments, which predicts that full fibre (FTTP) broadband ISP lines are on course to cover 95-96% of all UK properties by May 2027 (29 million premises) – rising to 97-98% for “gigabit-capable” networks (i.e. FTTP and Cable). According to the regulator’s latest data to January 2024 (here), some 62% (18.7m) of UK homes are currently within reach of a Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) network (up from 48% in Jan 2023) and this rises to 80% for gigabit-capable networks (up from 73%). The latter is being driven by both FTTP from multiple operators and Virgin Media’s older cable DOCSIS 3.1 network (there’s a lot of overbuild between these in urban areas): https://lnkd.in/e-ThFKbc #ispreview #telecoms #broadband #ofcom #networks #infrasructure #FTTP #gigabit

Gigabit Broadband Coverage Reaches 85 Percent of UK Premises 📌 New independent data shows that 85.06% of premises across the #UnitedKingdom can now access a gigabit-capable broadband connection, up from 80% at the end of 2023. This suggests that the first target under the Government’s £5 billion Project Gigabit programme has likely been met. However, the availability drops to 70.84% when considering only #fullfibre lines, highlighting the progress made and the remaining gap in achieving nationwide full fibre coverage. 🌐🛜 Read more on: https://lnkd.in/exqEeYGN

Ofcom has published their annual Connection Nations 2024 digital infrastructure report, which among many other things finds that residential gigabit-capable broadband ISP networks now cover 84% of the UK (up from 78% in 2023), while outdoor 5G mobile cover from at least one operator is available to 90-95% of premises (up from 85-93%). But rural cover remains poor. https://lnkd.in/eD_A_MjE

Ofcom Predict 98 Percent of UK Covered by Gigabit Broadband in May 2027 📌 #Ofcom has released the third edition of its forecast for Planned Network Deployments, predicting that #fullfibre broadband coverage in the UK will reach 95-96% of properties by May 2027. Additionally, gigabit capable #networks are expected to cover 97-98% of UK 🇬🇧 properties within the same timeframe, reflecting the rapid progress in broadband infrastructure development across the country. Read more on: https://lnkd.in/ejJnqeC5

Line speed is one thing, actual consistent performance is another. We are now in the world where the best competitive offer for a service is consistency... This is drawn from my personal experience where no matter whether it is 5G, 4G or even 3G, I regularly struggle to achieve data speeds above 300kbps inside of the M25 for mobile, and I do see blips in peak times on shared broadband services (although my current providers seems ok for now). How you monetise that though is difficult without a way to measure it.