Cityfibre Start £40m Swindon Build of 1Gbps FTTP Broadband

Network builder Cityfibre UK have just kicked off the construction phase of their £40m project to deploy a new 1Gbps capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTH) broadband network across the Wiltshire town of Swindon, which is being supported by civil engineering firm VolkerSmart Technologies.

The first homes and businesses to benefit from this new network will be in the Gorse Hill area, primarily those premises on the east side of the Techno Trading Estate. The operator already has a Dark Fibre network in the town, which as usual will help to form the foundation for their new deployment.

As usual this rollout forms part of the operator’s wider £4bn investment plan (here), which currently aims to cover around 1 million premises by the end of 2021 and then 8 million across 100+ cities and towns (c.30% of the UK) – the latter target is expected to be “substantially completed” by the end of 2025.

Neil Madle, CityFibre’s City Manager for Swindon, said:

“Swindon’s residents’ digital future is just around the corner. Work is now underway and that is something to be celebrated. Full Fibre broadband will help households access all the latest entertainment at lightning speed, but the benefits are far deeper than that – from enabling smart home technology to giving people the freedom to work from home with ease.

“The investment also comes at a critical time for Swindon’s forward-thinking business community. Next generation Full Fibre connectivity can drive innovation and productivity, ultimately giving businesses the platform, they need to realise their growth ambitions. And it won’t just improve business locally – it will also help businesses take their products or services to an international audience.”

However, Cityfibre won’t be the only gigabit-capable operator in town. Cable broadband provider Virgin Media already covers most of the area, while Openreach, Glide and OFNL also have some reasonable coverage in different parts (Openreach has quite a large deployment of G.fast too, although that is a slower and less reliable technology).

At present the operator hasn’t announced which of their retail ISP partners will be delivering a service to local homes, although both Vodafone (Gigafast Broadband) and TalkTalk seem likely to be the future options.

Regular readers will recall that Swindon has an awkward history when it comes to broadband provision. A few years ago the town used public investment to help support a new fixed wireless network, only for Openreach and Virgin Media to return and plug much of the remaining gap.