Openreach Secure Phase 4a Essex UK Superfast Broadband Rollout

The Essex County Council (ECC) has awarded Openreach (BT) with a £3.4m contract to rollout “superfast broadband” (FTTC/P) ISP networks to cover an additional 3,100 premises in the UK county, which includes 1,500 in the borough of Basildon and 1,600 in the district of Braintree.

At present around 93% of premises in Essex can already access a “superfast fibre broadband” (30Mbps+) network – mostly via FTTC (VDSL2) and a bit of FTTP – which includes 106,000 homes and businesses (expected to reach 149,400 by March 2020 – excluding Phase 4’s additions) that have benefited as a direct result of the state aid supported Superfast Essex project.

So far BT and Gigaclear have both picked up various contracts in Phase 1, 2 and 3 of the programme. Altogether it’s currently expected that local coverage of superfast broadband will reach around 97% by December 2019 and Essex council has made no secret of their desire to get as close to 100% as possible by 2021.

Last year we reported that plans for a future Phase 4 contract were also being designed (here), which would be partly funded by “project savings and subsidy refunds” from earlier contracts (public funding reinvestment via clawback / gainshare). On top of that the local councils and Broadband Delivery UK were also expected to contribute, potentially reaching an overall total pot of c.£29m.

Today’s announcement reflects the first Phase 4a contract award and at £3.4m it’s smaller than expected; although a second “stream” (i.e. another contract under Phase 4a) will be announced later this month. We note that Braintree’s council will contribute £356,000 to the 4a budget and £250,000 will come from Basildon’s local authority.

Lesley Wagland, Essex County Councillor, said:

“It is great to see how much the Superfast Essex programme has already achieved and to have the support of these two districts and the commitment from Openreach to deliver even more. We are concentrating on filling as many of the remaining gaps in coverage across Essex as possible.”

Tom Cunningham, Braintree District Councillor, said:

“Braintree District is a great place to do business and we have lots of fantastic businesses in the district already but we want to continue to improve what the area has to offer businesses and their workforce. We’re well connected in terms of location and connectivity but we know how important it is to invest further.

That’s why we’ve invested an additional £356,000 to reach 99% of the district with a focus on rural areas, making the Braintree District one of the most future-proofed and digitally connected areas in Essex for residents and businesses with download speeds of more than 30Mbps”.

Unfortunately the press release isn’t clear about what the technology split will be. Otherwise the deployment stage for Phase 4a is set to be delivered between October 2019 and September 2020 and we’ll keep our eyes open for the forthcoming Phase 4a Stream 2 announcement. The Superfast Essex project also has one of the best interactive rollout maps available for a BDUK supported project.