CityFibre and ISP Gigler Bring 1Gbps Packages to Bournemouth UK Firms

The CityFibre backed ISP Gigler, which supplies a 1000Mbps (500Mbps uploads) capable Fibre-to-the-Home (FTTH) broadband network to 21,000 premises in the south coast city of Bournemouth (England), has today launched a range of new business packages for local firms.

The news follows a little over two months after CityFibre first unveiled the extension of their network to cater for business customers within the Bournemouth area (here). But at the time of writing that article (August) Gigler had not yet launched the new packages and continued to only service residential subscribers. Now two new packages are finally live.

Gigler Business

1 Gigabit per second download speeds
500 Megabits per second upload speeds
500 GigaBytes (GB) data usage (no excess charges apply)
Business-grade wireless router
12 Month contract

PRICE: £50 a month (plus a one-off £100 installation charge)

Gigler Business Pro

1 Gigabit per second download speeds
500 Megabits per second upload speeds
1 TeraByte (TB) data usage (no excess charges apply)
Business-grade wireless router
12 Month contract

PRICE: £95 a month (plus a one-off £100 installation charge)

By comparison the most expensive residential package costs £50 a month but includes “unlimited” usage and an 18 month contract, while the connection charge is only £50 (currently reduced to £25 under a discount) instead of the £100 for business users. The cheapest home option costs £25 a month but only includes 80GB of usage (note: you’d pay £5 per 5GB boost beyond the 80GB).

It’s therefore unclear what other benefits business subscribers might receive over simply choosing the top home option. Similarly we assume the business prices are +vat but there’s no indication on the product details section and if you select to sign-up then the order page only offers the home packages; clearly some areas have yet to be correctly updated for the launch.

Greg Mesch, CEO of CityFibre, said:

“We have managed to bring a new generation of business broadband to life. From an easily affordable £50 a month, companies can plug in to speeds and a quality of internet experience that will be the envy of every business in the county making do with uninspiring, inferior connectivity. These new services complete the range for businesses of all sizes in Bournemouth, complementing the enterprise-grade Internet leased line and dark fibre services we currently offer. This is another important demonstration of CityFibre’s vision – pure fibre infrastructure delivering real benefits to all aspects of a community.”

CityFibre claims that the new products are “aimed at small to medium businesses frustrated by the shortcomings of so called ‘fibre’ business broadband services available from incumbent providers” (e.g. BT and Virgin Media). Apparently the service has already been tested by “a number of Bournemouth businesses” and all are said to have “experienced transformational efficiencies in their day to day operations“.

Naturally CityFibre and Gigler will be hoping that their new products are more successful than the current residential offerings, which don’t appear to have attracted more than a few hundred customers. One reason for this has to be the strong coverage of existing FTTC services from BT and similar cable options from Virgin Media, which might not be anything like as fast but they do offer plenty of extras (TV etc.) and often benefit from good advertising.