Full Fibre Broadband ISP GoFibre Sign Emtelle Supply Deal for Scottish Borders
Rural focused UK broadband ISP GoFibre (BorderLink), which is deploying a 10Gbps capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) network across the North of England and Scottish Borders area, has today signed a new supply deal with Emtelle UK, which is a global manufacturer of blown fibre and ducted network solutions.
Under the new deal, Emtelle will manufacture and supply GoFibre with the duct, sub-duct and fibre required to connect more than 8,000 premises across the borders town of Hawick to their new full fibre network. This will add to the 50,000 premises that GoFibre claim to have already covered by the end of July 2023 (up from 35k in late May 2023).
GoFibre recently stated that, once the next phase of expansion is complete, their network should reach almost 120,000 premises in early 2024.
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Colin Kirkpatrick, Emtelle’s Solutions Director, said:
“We are delighted to partner with GoFibre in bringing full fibre connectivity to Hawick. Emtelle, who have manufacturing facilities in Hawick and Jedburgh, leads the world in the field of passive network solutions, so we are especially proud to support this initiative and bring our world-leading technology to our hometown. Our partnership highlights the power of local businesses and suppliers working together.
By manufacturing and supplying the essential duct, sub-duct and fibre solutions, we are proud to play a vital role in connecting more than 8,000 premises in Hawick and support the growth of the local economy.”
The first customers are planned to be connected in Hawick during Autumn 2023. Standard pricing starts at £36 per month on a 24-month term for a 100Mbps package, which rises to £69 for 1000Mbps.
GoFibre’s full fibre broadband connection is live in:
Scottish Borders – Kelso, St Boswells, Coldstream, Galashiels, Melrose
Aberdeenshire – Portlethen, Newtonhill, Stonehaven
East Lothian – North Berwick, Dunbar, Haddington, Prestonpans
Fife – Cupar, Cardenden, BurntislandCurrently building its network in:
Aberdeenshire – Laurencekirk
Angus – Montrose, Kirriemuir, Forfar, Brechin
Midlothian – Gorebridge
Fife – Newport-on-Tay, Tayport
Teesdale – Middleton-in-Teesdale, Barnard Castle, Gainford, West Auckland
North Northumberland – Berwick-upon-Tweed, Seahouses, Wooler, Belford
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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So I have been tracking the progress of GoFibre’s advisory that they are going to do Gorebridge with fibre. Better Internet Dashboard so far shows that they have applied had approval for a number of streets in the town around blowing fibre in those streets.
So far it seems to be the main arterial roads in the town mostly PLUS, Gowkshill and what looks to the whole of Newtowngrange!
Would I take a 10Gb fibre pipe from them, hell yes but I bet that I cant afford the price if it was 10 times the cost of the 1Gb package.
That said very little in the way of side streets planned so far but I know its fairly early so my fingers are crossed that my street in Birkenside is on the list some time soon 🙂
Interesting that they are going into North Berwick, Dunbar, Haddington, Prestonpans in East Lothian and Virgin Media (nexfibre) are aggressively building out their network by largely using PIA from what I can see.
Gorebridge is already covered by VM too.
Virgin did not fully build out Gorebridge, they did at best 60% and never came back to finish the rest. When reading the local community forums there is constant complaints of the service and its performance over all its products.
I’m in Gorebridge and they built right up to my road and stopped (Lady Brae). I called and they said the rest was in plan but who knows what that means or how long it would be. Sitting here on 40mb feeling like I’m 15 again.
I am not sure about the business accum of this lot. They overbuild Cupar which has Openreach based FTTP but are more expensive than the likes of TalkTalk or Plusnet. How exactly is that going to work? Even if they had advanced plans to cover Cupar, they should have pulled out and cut their losses.
Then they announce they have started building in Newport/Tayport but it is four months before anyone actually shows up and does any actual work on the ground. Trust me I was keep a keen eye out for them. Finally despite it being a fortnight since GoFibre workmen turned up and attached fibre to the poll serving my house in Tayport their availability checker says they have *NO* plans to bring the network to my house!!! On further checking this holds true for any address in Newport or Tayport WTF!!!. I will be signing up the moment I can but really I do worry about their long term viability because they seem to being run by numpty’s.
GoFibre, a company that was started in Duns (as BorderLink), 7 miles up the road from me. No plans to come the 7 miles down the road though. Urgh. Nope Greenlaw is being avoided by all the fibre providers….