BT Expands 20Mbps Broadband ISP Services to 80% of UK Homes

BTWholesale, which is of course the wholesale division of UK telecoms operator BT, has released its latest “advanced copper” enablement update (February 2012) and confirmed that its up to 20Mbps (ADSL2+) capable (Wholesale Broadband Connect / 21CN) platform can now reach telephone exchanges serving around 80% of UK homes and businesses (20 million premises).

BT ultimately aims to extend the coverage of its up to 20Mbps broadband technology to 90% of the UK (22.5 million premises) by Spring 2013. This update is NOT to be confused with BT’s additional £2.5bn deployment of fibre optic based superfast broadband ( BT-Infinity , FTTC , FTTP ) services.

BTWholesale Update

Exchanges serving around 80% of UK homes and businesses are now enabled for Wholesale Broadband Connect (WBC) advanced copper services offering an up to 20Mbit/s broadband service with many additional benefits. BT Wholesale has announced its intention to WBC enable exchanges serving ~90% in Spring 2013.

All forward looking plans are subject to change. However, the expectations reflected in this forward-looking plan are reasonable, but because our rollout involves risks and uncertainties, actual results may differ materially from those expressed or implied by these forward-looking plans.

Unfortunately BT does not provide a dated overview of its exchange upgrade plan. In addition ADSL2+ remains a highly variable technology and anybody whom already receives sub-1Mbps download speeds via an existing up to 8Mbps (ADSLMax) line won’t see much of an improvement (sizeable boost in upload speeds notwithstanding). It should be said that most unbundled (LLU) broadband providers, such as TalkTalk and O2 (Be Broadband), have had similar ADSL2+ coverage for several years.