Hyperoptic Brings 1Gbps FTTP Broadband to its First UK Housing Estate

Urban fibre optic ISP Hyperoptic has taken a break from deploying “hyperfast” broadband to big apartment or office blocks in the major UK cities. Instead they’ve begun rolling out their Fibre-to-the-Premise (FTTP) network to a housing estate in Hertfordshire’s Welwyn Garden City.

The Bellway at QEII development, which is being managed by Bellway Homes, compromises 163 properties including houses and apartments; these tend to sell for between £319,995 (two-bedroom coach house) and £484,995 (four-bed home). This is unique for Hyperoptic and represents the first time that we’ve seen them run FTTP to individual houses (it’s usually only big buildings with lots of apartments or offices).

A number of homes at the new development have already been put up for sale (around Howlands – site of the former QEII hospital) and interestingly all future residents can expect to receive an initial three month FREE trial of Hyperoptic’s 1Gbps (1000Mbps) broadband and phone service, as well as free evening and weekend calls to fixed UK landlines. Usually it’s the cheapest 20Mbps option that gets offered for free, so this is another big change in approach.

Steve Holford, Hyperoptic’s Chief Customer Officer, said:

“For today’s modern family, having a reliable fast broadband connection is an essential utility that is priortised in the same league as good schools, a safe neighbourhood and strong transport links. Having a full fibre connection makes a home more attractive for prospective family buyers. The difference between an ADSL connection and our full fibre service is like night and day – we have had phenomenal feedback from customers as we have extended our footprint across the length and breadth of the UK.”

Jody Bryant, Sales Manager for Bellway Homes North London, added:

“Bellway at QEII is situated in one of the UK’s most desirable garden cities – the homes have been specially designed to give families all the space and contemporary services they could ever need from their home.

We also recognised at an early stage that physical infrastructure is just one part of the puzzle that makes a desirable family home. Today’s modern family is reliant on an increasing number of connected devices and without a fast, reliable broadband connection it can seriously impact their quality of life and indeed family harmony.

Full fibre broadband ensures that they should never have to worry about fluctuating speeds or peak time slowdowns, plus the property is future-proofed for any new advance in technology.”

The good news is that Hyperoptic doesn’t intend to stop at this development and they claim to already be “actively engaged” in discussions with developers who are building new homes across the United Kingdom, which will no doubt put them into direct competition with other operators that are working to deploy FTTP into new builds (BT, Virgin Media, GTC etc.).

Mind you Hyperoptic are already very familiar with such competition and they’ve had to deal with quite a bit of it around their primary cities of London, Birmingham, Glasgow, Cardiff, Bristol, Reading, Manchester, Leeds, Liverpool, Sheffield, Birmingham, Newcastle and Brighton. On top of that they’re also starting work to roll-out in Portsmouth, Watford, Leicester, Southampton, Slough, Edinburgh and Woking.

Customers typically choose either their broadband and phone bundles (attracts no connection fee) or a standalone broadband-only service (attracts a one-off connection fee of £40). Both types of package offer unlimited usage, 24/7 support, an included wireless router, 12 month contract term and dynamic IP (CGNAT) or add £5 for a Static IP instead. The current prices for these can be found below.

Bundles

20Mb Fibre Broadband & Phone
Price: £18 a month for 12 months (£25 thereafter)

100Mb Fibre Broadband & Phone
Price: £28 a month for 12 months (£38 thereafter)

1Gb Fibre Broadband & Phone
Price: £48 a month for 12 months (£63 thereafter)

Standalone

20Mb Fibre Broadband Only
Price: £16 a month for 12 months (£22 thereafter)

100Mb Fibre Broadband Only
Price: £26 a month for 12 months (£35 thereafter)

1Gb Fibre Broadband Only
Price: £46 a month for 12 months (£60 thereafter)