FullFibre Ltd Begin North Midlands FTTP Broadband Rollout UPDATE

Network builder FullFibre Limited has announced that their new gigabit-capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband ISP network has started to be deployed across the first areas of the North Midlands, with construction starting in the Staffordshire town of Leek. The neighbouring town of Cheadle will follow next week.

The operator, which runs its network as a wholesale platform via Fibre Heroes for other UK ISPs to harness (i.e. consumers should visit that site to check for coverage), has previously begun several builds across multiple towns in two other geographical regions – Midlands West (centred on Shropshire) and Midlands South (covering Herefordshire, Gloucestershire, Worcestershire and Warwickshire).

Three months ago they started to target the North Midlands too by naming 13 rural and semi-urban towns across Derbyshire, Staffordshire, West Yorkshire, and Nottinghamshire that would benefit from their deployment (here). Suffice to say, it’s impressive to see construction work starting on that phase so quickly, and the operator currently claims to be deploying at a rate of 15,000 premises passed per month.

Overall, the operator is now building to over 320,000 premises across 10 English counties, which means that more towns will be announced in the future to help reach their main coverage goal.

Chris Williams, Area General Manager for Midland North, said:

“We have worked incredibly hard since the funding announcement. In short order we have successfully assembled a highly experienced team of almost 40 professionals, established our regional office in Derby and completed the design for every town in our plans. More importantly, we recruited a group of contractors to work with our direct labour force who are well respected locally and capable of extremely fast paced delivery without compromising on quality.”

As it stands, the time between the funding announcement and Ready for Service (RFS) in parts of Leek looks likely to be less than 6 months. Once live, customers can expect to pay from around £25 per month for a 100Mbps package and that goes up to just £35 for 500Mbps, although the details will vary depending on which ISP you choose.

However, like most such alternative networks, FullFibre will face competition from gigabit-capable rivals in some of the towns they’re targeting.

UPDATE 24th Jan 2022

FullFibre has informed us that the first services should go live in Leek from April 2022.