Netomnia Claims First Full Fibre AltNet with Presence in All Four UK Countries
Alternative network builder Netomnia – supported by broadband ISP YouFibre – has today announced that their gigabit speed Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP / XGS-PON) network has now covered a total of 265,000 premises (up from 210k in August) and become the “first alt-net with presence in all four countries in the United Kingdom.”
The announcement largely reflects the fact that Netomnia has just begun their first fibre build in Northern Ireland for Londonderry. The operator said they’ll invest £12.9m to cover 43,000 premises in Londonderry. Excluding Openreach and Virgin Media, there aren’t many alternative networks (AltNet) present in N.Ireland, while Fibrus has so far only expanded into England, but not Scotland or Wales.
The latest deployment means that their ultrafast broadband network is now live in 35 towns and cities across the UK and is actively building in 60 towns and cities. The operator initially aims to cover 1 million premises by the end of 2023 and is currently being backed by investments worth £418m.
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In case anybody has forgotten, the operator recently published their full rollout plan for both the rest of 2022 and 2023, which includes various locations in N.Ireland (here).
Jeremy Chelot, CEO at Netomnia, said:
“We’re delighted to be bringing our network to Northern Ireland and the residents of Londonderry. Becoming the first alt-net with presence in all four countries across the UK is a fantastic achievement and is testament to the great work from the entire team and our brilliant build partners.
Passing 265,000 premises in such a short time frame is even more impressive and demonstrates our unprecedented growth, building faster than anyone across the industry and ultimately towards ensuring multi-gigabit connectivity for decades to come.”
The service itself is supplied to consumers via ISP YouFibre, which offers unlimited usage, symmetrical speeds, a Wi-Fi router, free installation and 24/7 UK based support. Customers pay from just £22 per month on an 18-month term for their unlimited 50Mbps package, which rises to £45 if you want their top 900Mbps plan (£50 thereafter). This is currently being offered with 3-6 months of free service.
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook, BlueSky, Threads.net and Linkedin.
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It’s crazy how some companies market themselves as “fastest in the UK” and then they only operate in one or 2 regions in England
I have high hopes for this network. I’m hoping to be able to order Youfibre in the coming months. I’m so happy they have decided to come to my street. Just waiting for them to light up the CBT they’ve already installed a few months ago and the best part is it’s symmetric and cheaper than Openreach fibre so now I don’t feel so bad about not paying them the £18k they wanted for Fibre on demand.
Make sure there are no hidden traps. For example, some altnets use CGNAT, so you won’t be able to do certain things, starting from something simple as an access to your CCTV from outside etc.
Gosh that’s a bit rubbish for a fibre ISP. Guess I’ll have to pay them the extra £5 a month for a static IP and no CGNAT. Thanks for the warning.
Hopefully they’ll rollout IPv6 soon. The IPv4 situation is quite anti competitive really as the ISPs who have been going decades have loads of IPs they got for minimal cost, whereas new ISPs need to purchase them (and they’re not cheap now)
CGNAT? OMG! No thanks!
I was planning on taking out a Youfibre/Netomnia contract. Now I won’t.
And please, lets not do the “IP addresses are scarce” thing as justification. They’re not. They just don’t want to pay for them. Remember, we’ve exhausted all of the IPv4 address space!! all of it !! but yet somehow new ISPs can grab a block from RIPE. Funny that, when they’re exhausted. Of course the reality is that ISPs fold. Institutions are forced to give some back etc. I used to work in a London uni with a /16. Only 3-5,000 students and only about 250 computers but yeah a /16. They still have it. 141.241.0.0/16 belongs to Kingston Uni.
Understanding is CGNAT for most people, those who pay for a static Ip at £5 per month don’t use CGNAT.
Available v4 addresses are scarce which is why they cost so much. No use to anyone a bunch being unused if they aren’t available.
I’m sure the US DoD don’t make full use of the 14 /8s they have but they’re sitting on them.
Current wait to get a /24 from RIPE is 256+ days. https://www.ripe.net/manage-ips-and-asns/ipv4/ipv4-waiting-list
Unfortunately some ISPs are able to hand addresses out like Smarties. With no mechanism to spread the goodness and players with very deep pockets buying up what they can it’s tough. Amazon have acquired 3.0.0.0/8 and 44.192.0.0/10, among others, Apple have 17.0.0.0/8. The scarcity means megabucks per address even though the efficiency of usage may be low.
I agree, can’t wait till Netominia do Temple Ewell area as confirmed its in their roll out plan for ‘Dover’, just hope it’s my lane as info not on their web site about which roads.
Crack open the Champagne when (hopefully not if) it happens although in this climate might be “Happy Shopper Cola” instead 🙂
Breaking records these guys. Getting Tewkesbury live in 22 days and now this! Incredible
It’s not possible to build a city / town in 22 days. Anyone can delay their announcement to just before go live, then just put a couple of houses live.
I’m waiting for the “live next day” announcement soon…
I was being sarcastic Anon don’t worry
Been waiting since January. Infrastructure is in but still not live….
They seem to have quite a few installs on the go. I’m hoping they cover me before my VM contract expires mid next year
When will the Netomnia wholesale product open up? keen to get some NNIs up and running. Great seeing their deployment grow across the UK.
Excited to see how their service is! their map shows i’m getting covered 🙂
No wonder they are building so fast as they don’t have a care in the world for rules.
Seem multiple cbts on policy decayed poles that have test dates pre dating there role out.
They are also cutting and damaging others equipment.
Sounds like sour grapes from a competitor, possible on that owns the ducts. The poles are Openreach responsibility not Netominia. They do two methods to house – via existing ducts and via a drop wire from an Openreach pole. The ducts are sectioned for each operator (typically at least capable of up to 3 operator CBT’s in a standard pit) with pull out arms that hold the cbt when in a duct.
Anon
Im well aware of how cbts, installs amd apparatus work and no i dont work for OR although i used to.
Nobody including Openreach can put equipment on Decayed Poles they should not be touched at all for safety reasons.