After a long trial Openreach (BT) has finally announced the official launch of their new 500Mbps and 1Gbps (or 1000Mbps+ if you prefer) Fibre-to-the-Premise (FTTP) based broadband products and prices, which marks a significant boost from its previous top speed of 330Mbps (30Mbps uploads).
The operator’s native FTTP service is currently available to around 327,000 premises across the United Kingdom and they aim to push this coverage to roughly 2 million premises by 2020, albeit with many of those reflecting new build home developments and businesses. But until today the top download speed of this service had been limited to 330Mbps (Megabits per second).
Naturally Openreach are being mindful of the fact that a growing number of rival fibre optic networks (e.g. Hyperoptic, Gigaclear, B4RN etc.) can already offer 1Gbps capable packages and as such they’ve been busy trialling a 1Gbps tier product for quite awhile. However rivals often offer symmetric speeds, while Openreach’s new products remain asymmetric with slower uploads.
Part of this trial has involved the testing of new processes and techniques, which aim to make the expensive deployment phase both quicker and cheaper. At the same time Openreach has sought to reduce the end-user installation time (a simple 2 hour appointment will often be all that’s now needed); this has in the past proven to be a hindrance due to the need for “multiple visits by an engineer.”
Today we finally learn how much the new tiers will actually cost and when ISPs can start to offer them.
From Wednesday 7th Dec 2016, ISPs will be able to order (+vat):
* 500Mbps Download / 165Mbps Upload at £55 p.c.m. rental and £500 connection
* 1000Mbps Download / 220Mbps Upload at £80 p.c.m. rental and £500 connection
By comparison the existing 330Mbps option continues to attract a standard £38 +vat per month rental, although this is the wholesale cost and ISPs will naturally charge more at retail because they have to add data allowances, 20% VAT, service features, profit margins and various other costs on top.
It’s perhaps also fair to say that the new tiers are considered premium options, which have more of a business focus, and as such they will end up being somewhat more expensive than the residential focused 1Gbps options from ISPs like Hyperoptic (i.e. £63 per month for 1Gbps).
Clive Selley, Openreach CEO, said:
“We’re committed to taking the UK from being a superfast to an ultrafast nation, and whilst we’re extending the reach of our Fibre-to-the-Premises network, we’re also boosting the speed and variety of the services we can offer over it.
We’ve been working closely with our wholesale CP customers to develop these new ultrafast products, and we expect the new higher speed services will be of particular interest to small and medium businesses.
This is another example of how our mixed technology approach is getting the fastest possible speeds to the largest number of people in the shortest possible timeframe.”
We should point out that slower FTTP options can also be taken, such as the 40Mbps (2Mbps upload) tier from £15.29 +vat per calendar month (wholesale) that is designed to complement Openreach’s FTTC options.
However the £500 connection charge on the two new tiers is significantly more expensive than the 330Mbps and slower options, all of which attract a one-off fee of just £92 +vat. Openreach has attempted to moderate this impact by running a special offer for the first year (until 8th December 2017), which cuts the fee in half to £250.
Today’s news follows hot on the heels of the first pricing for Openreach’s new 160Mbps and 330Mbps capable G.fast broadband technology (here), which are cheaper and more aimed towards the residential market.
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