Home » UK ISP News Archive » Monthly Archives: February 2015 (89 Posts Found)

ISP News Archives for February 2015

BT Finalises GBP12.5bn Acquisition of EE’s Mobile Network in the UK

5th Feb 2015 (35 Comments)

After several weeks of exclusive talks BT has today announced that they’ve “agreed definitive” terms to acquire national mobile operator EE for £12.5bn, which is to be payable as a combination of cash and new BT ordinary shares issued to both of EE’s joint owners Deutsche Telekom (Germany) and Orange (France).

CityFibre and Logicalis to Construct Fibre Optic Ring Network in Newport

4th Feb 2015 (1 Comment)

CityFibre are in the news for a second time today because they’ve just teamed up with Logicalis, a global IT solutions provider, to build a new high-capacity pure fibre optic ring network in Wales’s third biggest city of Newport, which is curiously called a “Community Safety Network“.

UK YouView Broadband IPTV Service Picks Sony for First Integrated TV

4th Feb 2015 (3 Comments)

The broadband based YouView video-on-demand and catch-up TV (IPTV) service, which is being bundled by a number of ISPs (e.g. BT and TalkTalk) in the United Kingdom and can also be brought separately at retail, has officially branched out into the integrated TV market with Sony’s new 2015 BRAVIA range becoming the first to benefit.

CityFibre’s Aberdeen Fibre Optic Broadband Network Build Starts in March

4th Feb 2015 (0 Comments)

Fibre optic infrastructure builder CityFibre has told today’s Transform Digital Conference that their plan to create Scotland’s first “Gigabit City“, by rolling out a new 1000Mbps capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) style network around the city of Aberdeen, is progressing and the network build should finally begin next month (March 2015).

UPDATE Cumbria’s Fibre GarDen FTTP Broadband Rollout on Knife Edge

4th Feb 2015 (7 Comments)

The community owned Digital Dales (Fibre GarDen) project, which is supposed to be building a 100Mbps capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband network across the rural villages of Garsdale and Dentdale in Cumbria (England), is in doubt again after councillors put the plan to a vote.

Virgin Media Criticise Rival ISPs and Sky for Offering FREE Broadband Deals

4th Feb 2015 (16 Comments)

Cable operator Virgin Media, which likes to think of itself as a premium provider, has heavily criticised rival ISPs like Sky Broadband and TalkTalk for offering aggressively cheap “free broadband” promotions. The Liberty Global owned operator warned the situation was “completely paradoxical and ironic” because it risks damaging the case for investment in future upgrades.

Vague Results from Sky Reveal Confusing UK Broadband Performance

4th Feb 2015 (1 Comment)

Sky Plc (Sky Broadband) has today released the first batch of consolidated Q4-2014 (calendar) results since they merged Sky Italia (Italy) and Sky Deutschland (Germany) into the fold last year. But unfortunately this appears to have come at the cost of any useful data on their broadband and phone operations in the United Kingdom.

Coventry, Solihull and Warwickshire UK Sign Extended Fibre Broadband Deal

3rd Feb 2015 (12 Comments)

The state aid supported CSW Broadband project has signed a new £10.73m Phase 2 Broadband Delivery UK contract with BT, which will help a further 17,000+ premises to receive “fibre broadband” (FTTC/P) and push total coverage to “nearly” 94%. But worryingly the project will not complete until summer 2019, well behind the Government’s end of 2017 target.

UK Mobile Data Traffic Tops 0.9 ExaBytes in 2014 as Avg Speeds Hit 2.5Mb

3rd Feb 2015 (0 Comments)

Cisco has today published their annual Global Mobile Data Traffic Forecast (2014 – 2019), which reported that mobile data traffic in the United Kingdom reached 74.2 PetaBytes (PB) per month in 2014 (0.9 Exabytes per year) and this will rise to 634.4PB by 2019 (7.6 Exabytes per year). Internet video traffic continues to be the main driver.

Digital Scotland Unveils Next 43 Areas for BT Fibre Broadband Upgrades

3rd Feb 2015 (13 Comments)

The Digital Scotland project has today revealed the next batch of 43 locations (54,000 premises), including parts of the remote Outer Hebrides, Mull and the Isle of Bute, that will benefit from their on-going £410m project with BT to ensure that “fibre broadband” (FTTC/P) services are available to 85% of premises in Scotland by the end of 2015 and 95% by the end of 2017.

UK Government Moot Using Public Sector Networks to Help Boost Broadband

3rd Feb 2015 (2 Comments)

The United Kingdom is crisscrossed by a variety of different Public Sector Networks (PSN), which are used to supply councils, Network Rail, universities (JANET), security / military services and so forth. But many of these networks are not fully utilised and the Government intends to harness this to help improve broadband for homes and businesses.

DEFRA UK Report Calls for 10Mbps Universal Broadband Commitment

3rd Feb 2015 (15 Comments)

The Commons Select Committee for the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA) has today published the results of their inquiry into the roll-out of faster broadband Internet access to rural areas, which among other things calls for the current Universal Service Commitment (USC) speed of at least 2Mbps (Megabits) to be increased to 10Mbps.

UK ISP TalkTalk Tops 4.236M Broadband Subscribers and Sells Off-Net Base

3rd Feb 2015 (1 Comment)

Low cost ISP TalkTalk has today published their latest results for Q4-2014 (calendar), which reported that broadband subscribers increased at the stable rate of +15K (same as in Q3) in the quarter to total 4,236,000 and “Superfast Fibre Broadband” (FTTC) surged forward by +88K (up from +67K in Q3) to account for 396,000 of that total.

ISP KC Warns Customers in Hull to be Aware of SCAM Callers

3rd Feb 2015 (0 Comments)

Customers of the incumbent telecoms operator for Hull and East Yorkshire in England, KC (KCOM), have been advised to be on their guard after a number of subscribers reported receiving calls from fraudsters who attempted to trick them into revealing their credit card or other vital personal details.

List of BT Exchanges Set for a Spring 21CN WBC Broadband Upgrade

2nd Feb 2015 (24 Comments)

Interestingly BT appears to have informed UK ISPs that they plan to upgrade a large swathe of predominantly smaller telephone exchanges, many of which are in rural areas, from their older and slower 20th Century Network (20CN) based broadband and phone platform to the latest 21CN and Wholesale Broadband Connect (WBC) service between April and June 2015.

Ofcom Tweak Commits Mobile Operators to 90% UK Landmass Coverage

2nd Feb 2015 (14 Comments)

As expected Ofcom has started to put the recent coverage agreement between Mobile Network Operators (MNO) and the Government into practice by introducing a new licence variation(s) that commits Three UK, EE, O2 and Vodafone to provide voice coverage across 90% of the United Kingdom’s landmass by the end of 2017.

ISPr Survey – Broadband Helping Two Thirds of People to Remote Work

2nd Feb 2015 (3 Comments)

More and more people across the United Kingdom appear to be taking part in remote working (online). According to our latest monthly survey of 1,095 readers, some 67.6% of respondents said they now remote work from home or while commuting to their day job (32.3% said they don’t remote work at all) and access to better broadband is almost certainly helping the trend.