Openreach’s 100Gbps Cablelink Pilot for UK Broadband ISPs Set for May 2027
National network operator Openreach has informed ISPreview that their long planned pilot of a 100Gbps capable Cablelink (Ethernet) solution is now scheduled to start around May 2027. The new product will, among other things, be used by ISPs to support the rollout of their 8.5Gbps speed full fibre (FTTP / XGS-PON) broadband products for UK homes.
Cablelink products are traditionally what Openreach are using to provide data capacity for their full fibre and other connections (i.e. the connection between their fibre headend and an internet provider’s own equipment). But at present the fastest links available only go up to 10Gbps, which will start to become a bit tedious now that Openreach are beginning to expand the reach of their 8.5Gbps speed FTTP broadband pilot.
Suffice to say that using multiple 10G Cablelinks to supply that service with capacity isn’t the most efficient approach, especially for busy areas. The solution, as we first revealed back in March 2026 (here), is for Openreach to introduce a new 100G Cablelink Service Connect (CSC) product. But until now we didn’t have a strong idea of when the first trials of this would actually begin.
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The latest update we’ve had is that the 100G CSC pilot is currently scheduled to start around May 2027 (tentative internal target), which we understand will include support for both their future Ethernet Access Direct 2.0 (EAD) and existing Generic Ethernet Access (GEA) headends (aka – Optical Line Terminals – OLT).
In simple terms, Openreach will allow 100G CSC to be used to supply capacity for their full fibre (FTTP), hybrid fibre (FTTC – SOGEA / VDSL2) broadband and latest Ethernet products.
Speaking of which, “most” of the GEA headends being selected for the CSC pilot will also be included in the ever expanding XGS-PON pilot, which was to be expected.
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.
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