BT Sign £9.8m Contract to Deploy Full Fibre Broadband in Swansea Bay City Region
The Swansea Bay City Deal’s Digital Infrastructure Programme has awarded a £9.8m contract to BT under their Better Broadband Infill Project, which will see Openreach being tasked with rolling out a “full fibre broadband” (FTTP) ISP network to nearly 1,800 hard-to-reach sites across the Swansea Bay City Region.
Just to recap. The UK and Welsh Governments gave their approval for a £55m digital infrastructure investment under the £1.3bn Swansea Bay City Region project back in 2021 (here), which among other things aimed to expand full fibre and 5G mobile connectivity to benefit residents and businesses across Carmarthenshire, Neath Port Talbot, Pembrokeshire and Swansea. Some of this investment also comes from the Local Broadband Fund (LBF) for Wales.
Several digital infrastructure projects are already taking place under this programme (examples here and here) and the new contract forms an additional part of that. BT will also provide additional funding to increase the overall value of the project to more than £10 million, although the announcement doesn’t appear to include an exact figure for this.
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The deal will bring full fibre broadband access to 1,533 premises and an additional 256 sites across the four counties in the Swansea Bay City Region: Pembrokeshire, Swansea, Neath Port Talbot and Carmarthenshire. The project specifically targets premises that currently have broadband speeds of less than 30Mbps and who are not in scope for any other government-funded fibre expansion projects or part of commercial build plans.
Susi Marston, Head of Public Sector Wales at BT, said:
“Connectivity is at the heart of how people live and work today, but all of that relies on the right infrastructure being in place.
The Better Broadband Infill Project will improve services for thousands of people across the Swansea Bay City Region, who will benefit from state-of-the-art connectivity even in hard-to-reach areas.”
Cllr. Rob Stewart, Leader of Swansea Council, said:
“This project is a game-changer for our region. By bringing high-speed internet to areas that have been left behind, we are not only improving quality of life but also opening up new opportunities for economic and social development.
Access to reliable broadband is no longer a luxury; it’s a necessity. This project will ensure that everyone in the Swansea Bay region can participate fully in the digital age.”
The new project is set to start this month and will continue its delivery across the region over six phases, with the first 220 premises connected by December 2025 and a completion date being set for 31st March 2027. Last year’s related Prior Information Notice (PIN) may offer a rough indication of the premises that might benefit from this (here).
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook, BlueSky, Threads.net and Linkedin.
Is this really value for money?
Can’t be worse than the new council office or the roundabout that they botched into a slow stoplight near the city centre. Councils desperately need to be DOGEd
Yes, we need people who know nothing about each field they have to optimize to “doge” councils. I’m sure that’s an amazing idea.
HaRd to reach area in Swansea Bay? It is hardly the middle of know Where and coverage is already PRETTY GOOD
The “city region” are covers the whole of south west Wales from Port Talbot to Pembrokeshire. Even in the Swansea local authority, there are rural locations which might not be attractive for commercial broadband deployment, for example parts of Gower and the old Mawr ward to the north-west of the city.