BT Unveil Large Ultrafast G.fast Broadband Pilot and 1Gbps FTTP Trials

Telecoms giant BT has today announced an expansion of their “ultrafast fibre” broadband plans in the United Kingdom, which will see a pilot of 330-500Mbps capable G.fast technology going live with 25,000 premises in Cambridgeshire and Kent, as well as a new 1Gbps business FTTP pilot in Bradford.

On top of that the operator has announced that it will also expand upon last month’s agreement to deliver “fibre based” (FTTC/P) broadband connectivity into new build properties (here) by offering to build Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) “free of charge” to new housing developments with 250+ premises (a joint funding option is available to smaller developments.).

However it’s worth noting the caveat to the new build housing pledge, which states: “Construction of Fibre to the Premises infrastructure (the ducting, poles and wires) will be carried out for free on developments of more than 250 premises. Standard connection and ongoing service provider charges will apply and excess construction charges will continue to apply where the site is more than 4.5 kilometres from Openreach’s existing fibre network.” So it will be free, albeit only so long as you’re near their fibre network, which is understandable.

Clive Selley, CEO of Openreach, said:

“The UK is a leader when it comes to superfast broadband. Nine out of ten premises have access to fibre today and this will grow to 95 per cent by the end of next year – but I want to get high speeds to everyone, so we’re also developing solutions for the final five per cent of the country.

I’m determined to roll out ultrafast broadband, and G.fast technology is the best way to deliver that to the majority of the UK as quickly as possible. We also plan to roll out significantly more fibre-to-the-premises, and we’re trialling a range of options in Bradford to use that technology increasingly in future – wherever it makes sense.

A large number of new housing developments will also get fibre-to-the-premises infrastructure built for free under our latest plans, so that’s great news for developers and homeowners too.”

Under the current plan BT intend to begin the commercial roll-out of G.fast during summer 2017 (here), which will follow the aforementioned pilot this summer, and they’ve pledged to make the new service available to 10 million homes and businesses by 2020, with “most of the UK” expected to be covered by 2025.

At first G.fast will only offer speeds of up to 330Mbps (50Mbps upload), but this will eventually reach 500Mbps. The two new pilots (12,500 premises in each location) will be conducted in Cherry Hinton (Cambridgeshire) and Gillingham (Kent), which follow the current trials being conducted in parts of Swansea (Wales), Huntingdon (Cambridgeshire) and Gosforth (Newcastle).

We should add that Openreach has also set a downstream prioritised rate 80Mbps for their G.fast service, which is also the top speed of their current VDSL based Fibre-to-the-Cabinet (FTTC) technology that can reach 24 million premises (over 80% UK coverage).

Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP)

Meanwhile the new FTTP trial in Bradford (Kirkgate High Street and Listerhills Science Park) aims “to explore if the technology can be installed faster and more efficiently in business parks and high streets“. Apparently work has already started on the network and the first businesses are expected to be connected in late Spring 2016.

The trial will complement several existing FTTP related trials, such as those occurring in the North Swindon development of Haydon Wick and other locations like the villages of Campton and Meppershall (details).

The press release added: “Although every business in the UK already has access to ultrafast speeds via dedicated lines or ‘Ethernet’, the results of the Bradford trials – and feedback from industry – could lead to a new business-grade FTTP product being developed for SMEs with speeds of up to 1Gbps and strong service guarantees.”

Unlike G.fast, which is a hybrid-fibre and copper broadband technology, FTTP is a pure fibre optic connection that can deliver even faster and more reliable speeds. However it does have the disadvantage of also being slower and more expensive to deploy, which is why BT tends to prefer the cheaper VDSL (FTTC) and G.fast approach.

At present the top download speed available on BTOpenreach’s FTTP network, which is available to well over 200,000 UK premises, is 330Mbps and the new “premium” (business) trial of 1000Mbps (1Gbps) FTTP has long been expected. We should add that the new trial is expected to offer upload speeds of 100Mbps and the downstream prioritised rate will be set at 100Mbps.

Today’s news flows on from yesterday’s report, which saw BT Group’s CEO, Gavin Patterson, confirming that they were working to “accelerate the deployment of fibre-to-the-premises significantly” (here) and much of that is in the hope that it will help to placate some of Ofcom’s Strategic Review findings (here).

However, outside of trials and support for new build home developments, there’s still no firm commitment to a wide-scale national roll-out of FTTP. Hopefully we might see more on that in the near future.