Cityfibre to Finish Edinburgh’s 100km Fibre Optic FTTP Network Extension

Fibre optic developer Cityfibre has issued an update on the £5.6m deal with Edinburgh City Council in Scotland, which is extending their existing Gigabit capable Fibre-to-the-Premise (FTTP) broadband network in the city to around 150km. The work is now expected to complete by the end of next month.

The 7-year deal, which includes an option to extend to 19 years and potentially grow in value to £16 million, began its 100km Edinburgh CORE network extension in September 2015 and at the time they indicated that the roll-out would be completed within 12 months. Today Cityfibre has confirmed that they’ve successfully held to that target.

Once complete the new 1Gbps+ capable FTTP network will be able to reach around 7,000 local businesses and more than 300 public sector sites, such as schools, libraries and office buildings. The deployment is being supported by Cityfibre’s local ISP partner, Commsworld.

The developer claims that this will turn Edinburgh into the “UK’s largest Gigabit City“.

James McClafferty, CityFibre’s Head of Development in Scotland, said:

“Reaching 100km is a significant milestone for the project, which has been a truly collaborative process, working with our partners, Commsworld. Spanning 150km, which stretched out would take you from Edinburgh to Aberdeen, the completed network will establish Edinburgh as the UK’s largest Gigabit City which is a real coup for its businesses and services.”

Iain Ross, Director of Finance at The Festival and King’s Theatres, said:

“When faced with the failure of our original supplier to provide a dedicated fibre network to allow us to host a major conference at the Festival Theatre, we turned to CityFibre and Commsworld who have delivered impeccably across all areas.

They ensured our public WiFi network was installed in time and as a result, we were able to provide an outstanding service to over 800 attendees, each using multiple devices. We have no doubt that the Edinburgh Gigabit City project will be of major benefit to Edinburgh and businesses operating in the city, and are delighted to have found such reliable and focused partners to provide exceptional public WiFi in our theatres.”

The good news is that Cityfibre won’t stop at 150km and there is already a hint of “ambitious plans” to roll-out even further, although it’s too early to talk about the details. Cityfibre also has a similar network in the Scottish cities of Aberdeen and Glasgow.

The original contract itself was part of a wider £186 million outsourced ICT procurement for the council won by global ICT firm CGI, which aimed to create the “single largest pure fibre city roll-out” in the United Kingdom.

Some 150 engineers and workers were involved during the project’s peak and at the time of writing around 126km of the total network has already been completed.