ISP Community Fibre Makes Progress on Wandsworth 1Gbps Broadband Rollout

Two years ago the London Borough of Wandsworth announced that it had teamed-up with local ISP Community Fibre to roll-out a new 1000Mbps capable ultrafast fibre optic (FTTP/H) broadband network to 20,000 council homes. The provider has so far done 5,500 and the next areas are now being announced.

The ISP has been making good progress on their deployment to council managed blocks (apartments etc.), which forms one part of their grander ambition to cover 500,000 homes in London (here). This was recently given another boost, in July 2017, after they managed to secure £11.3m of private equity investment from RPMI Railpen and existing shareholders (here).

At present the initial target in Battersea, Wandsworth and Roehampton is for this roll-out to reach 10,000 premises by the end of 2017 (potentially rising to 20,000 in the future) and they’re already halfway there, with estates including the Savona, Patmore, Carey Gardens, Doddington, Kambala, Rollo and Surrey Lane having completed.

The council has now confirmed that the next in line to benefit will be properties on the Winstanley and York Road estates, St James Grove and the Ashburton, Wendlesworth, Arndale, William Willison and Alton estates.

Claire Salier, Spokesperson for the Council’s Housing Dpt, said:

“Ultrafast broadband means residents on our estates will be able to use multiple device, easily work from home or run a small business, stream as much media as they want and truly make the most of fast online access.

I’m delighted that our partnership with Community Fibre has already connected so many homes, and I would urge residents on the next wave of estates to find out what this service could offer them.”

Existing packages start at just £20 per month for a 20Mbps (1Mbps upload) service and rise to £50 for a symmetric 1000Mbps connection, which includes free installation and unlimited usage. The ISP may also be making use of Openreach’s Physical Infrastructure Access (PIA) product in order to help deliver the coverage. No additional line rental payment is required.

We should point out that Community Fibre are also known to deploy a slower Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) network for some locations, although it’s unclear whether this is being used for any of their roll-outs in Wandsworth.

UPDATE 2:31pm

Community Fibre has confirmed that their wireless network is not being used as part of the Wandsworth deployment, it’s all “full fibre“.