Northern Ireland Completes Major Local Full Fibre Network Project

The Full Fibre Northern Ireland (FFNI) Consortium, which is made up of 10 councils outside Belfast and the Business Services Organisation (BSO), has confirmed the completion of their project to rollout a new full fibre broadband network to connect 887 public sector sites. The network itself was built by UK ISP Fibrus.

Overall, the project, which was supported by £23.1m of state aid from the UK Government’s Local Full Fibre Networks (LFFN – Wave 3) programme, has connected over 240 GP surgeries, 148 community centres, 90 council offices, 79 recycling centres, 69 fire stations and 63 leisure centres. The sites all now have access to gigabit data speeds.

The project was led by the Newry, Mourne and Down District Councils. Like most LFFN schemes the plan reflected a Public-Sector Anchor Tenancy model, which is primarily focused upon connecting public sector sites to fibre. However, such networks are often also opened-up so that commercial broadband ISPs can invest in them, which enables the infrastructure to help reach local homes and businesses with FTTP.

Councillor Michael Savage said:

“FFNI is essentially an Economic Development and Regeneration project and this multi-million-pound investment will assist those at risk of digital exclusion, create local jobs and allow public sector partners to offer more digital services to businesses and residents across the district.

The collaboration between public-sector bodies through FFNI has played a key role in supporting digital ambitions, which will empower our local communities and businesses to bounce back from the pandemic and the positive impact will be even more far reaching for years to come.”

We should point out that the original ambition of this project was to complete the work by March 2021, which was later delayed to December 2021 after the contract was awarded. But in the end, it appears to have taken a fair bit longer than that to reach full completion.

List of the 10 FFNI Councils

Antrim and Newtownabbey

Fermanagh and Omagh

Ards and North Down

Lisburn and Castlereagh

Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon

Mid and East Antrim

Causeway Coast and Glens

Mid Ulster

Newry, Mourne and Down

Derry City and Strabane