UPDATE BT Hails Strong Uptake of Superfast Broadband in Cornwall UK

Telecoms giant BT has today reported that their joint £132m Superfast Cornwall project with the EU, which has already deployed the operators “fibre broadband” (FTTC/P) network to cover around 95% of local premises (including the Isles of Scilly), has seen strong uptake by local premises with 60,000 subscribers choosing to adopt it.

At the last count in April 2014 the project had helped 210,000 premises (roughly 90% coverage) to receive the service and over 50,000 had subscribed, which means that uptake has been hovering around the 25% mark. On top of that some 62,000 of those premises were reachable by BT’s ultrafast 330Mbps Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) network.

Sadly we don’t currently have the latest premises passed figure for Cornwall (awaiting a reply from BT), although given past and present progress we’d assume that the above uptake figure to still be a fairly good indication.

The Superfast Cornwall team have also surveyed 2,200 local businesses, specifically those that can access the new network, and this reveals that 43% of those were now using “fibre broadband” from a range of ISPs.

Nigel Ashcroft, Programme Director of Superfast Cornwall, said:

“I’m thrilled to see that the take up by businesses is high. The roll out of fibre broadband across Cornwall is a game changer for businesses, it gives them an opportunity to become global players. Cornwall has better coverage than some cities in the EU and this research shows that our businesses are truly in the mind-set to capitalise on this opportunity.”

But the work won’t stop at 95% coverage and a report published in January 2015 revealed that approximately 38,000 premises are still expected to be below the “super-fast” 30Mbps+ capable level, of which an estimated 13,000 are also beyond the current “fibre footprint“.

Shortly after that it was confirmed that additional investment would be supplied (here and here) to bring “fibre-based superfast broadband within reach of 99% of businesses and families across the Duchy,” said Dan Rogerson, a North Cornwall MP.

The preliminary plan suggested that the follow-on programme would commence in July 2015 and aim to complete by March 2019, which is anticipated to cost around £18.747m using a mix of public and private funding sources. You can probably guess which operator will do the delivery.

UPDATE 18th March 2015

BT’s reply came in a little too late for us to post yesterday, but we understand that the premises passed figure is now 237,000.