Swish Fibre Add 4 Yorkshire Locations to FTTP Broadband Build

Fibre builder and UK ISP Swish Fibre, which until now has been busy deploying their gigabit-capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband network to cover 250,000 premises across the Home Counties of England, has begun to extend their plans into Yorkshire by establishing a new subsidiary – Swish Fibre Yorkshire.

The operator, which is being backed by an investment of £225m from Fern Trading (they also back Giganet, AllPoints Fibre, Jurassic Fibre and Vorboss), has so far focused most of its efforts upon various locations in Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Kent, Surrey, Sussex, Oxfordshire, Northamptonshire and Hampshire.

However, Swish Fibre Yorkshire is said to mark the “brand’s first move to deliver their future-proofed 10,000Mbps capable Full Fibre broadband network to underserved homes and businesses outside of the South of England“, although that’s debateable as Northamptonshire is more in the Midlands.

The good news is that the operator has already revealed the first four locations to benefit from their expansion into Yorkshire (see below), which will start in the North of the region. The subsidiary added that they would also be working in conjunction with the government’s Gigabit Broadband Voucher Scheme to help further extend their coverage.

Swish Fibre’s First 4 Yorkshire Locations
Boroughbridge
South Milford
Hillam
Sherburn in Elmet

Sadly, they haven’t said how many premises in each location will benefit or when these builds are planned to be completed. The news follows Swish Fibre’s acquisition of Essex-based Full Fibre ISP, People’s Fibre, in December last year (here).

Brice Yharrassarry, CEO of Swish Fibre, said:

“The launch of Swish Fibre Yorkshire is a key milestone for us as we look to expand our footprint across the UK and drive an increase in market share through both organic and inorganic growth.”

Bob Snowden, MD of Swish Fibre Yorkshire, added:

“I’m delighted to have joined the Swish family and to deliver such a brilliant brand and service to the people of my home county. My team’s vast experience on the ground here will perfectly complement Swish Fibre’s industry-leading infrastructure as we look to rapidly build and deploy state-of-the-art Full Fibre networks in the region. We’re also incredibly honoured to bring new employment opportunities to Yorkshire.”

One problem we can see here is with the added consumer confusion that such a move may create. The current market is already a brain taxing mess of choice, which requires a great deal of research for the uninitiated to successfully navigation. Swish’s move to create a new website for their subsidiary (here), thus splitting their consumer facing web presence, certainly won’t make that problem any easier.

We’d also love to get a bit more detail from Swish on their current build progress and a solid target date for completion of their work. We can clearly see that they’ve been making progress in various locations like Farnham, Farncombe, Haslemere, Gerrards Cross, Beaconsfield, Marlow, Thame and others. But no solid premises passed figures have been released, despite the build starting a couple of years ago.

Otherwise, new customers can expect to pay from £20 per month on an 18-month term (£30 thereafter) for their entry-level 150Mbps (symmetric) package, which rises to £50 (£75 thereafter) for their top 900Mbps tier. But you do have to pay a £50 one-off activation fee to cover the installation and router etc. A more expensive no-contract option is also available without the discounts.