Fibrus Bring UK Full Fibre Broadband Network to 354,000 Premises

Cabling solutions provider ACOME Group today caused a bit of confusion after they seemed to announce that network builder and ISP Fibrus, which is one of their UK partners, had extended their 2Gbps FTTP broadband network to cover 400,000 premises across England and Northern Ireland. But the actual figure is 354,000 (337k RFS).

According to the announcement: “The use of ACOME Group’s cabling solutions has helped Fibrus speed up its fibre installations and reach its target of 400,000 homes passed across rural and regional areas of Cumbria and Northern Ireland by March 2024“. The same release then somewhat contradicted this in the editors notes by saying Fibrus “has already passed more than 380,000 homes“, with 80,000 live customers.

In order to accelerate the speed of deployment, ACOME said Fibrus’ street cabinets were fitted with an optical distribution solution that was pre-cabled at ACOME’s manufacturing plant in Brittany. The ITOM-V3 optical distribution solution eliminated the need to splice at the cabinet, which meant the risk of project schedules changing and budget not being met were reduced.

The network operator has also begun trialling ACOME Group’s 60-fibre cable constructed with nanomodule technology, which is said to reduce the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) and carbon footprint of deployments.

Andrea Garcia, ACOME Group UK Director, said:

“We are delighted to help Fibrus deliver ultra-fast reliable connectivity to those residents and businesses in Cumbria and Northern Ireland. Our 60-fibre cabling [with a 12-fibre modularity] has saved installation times, provided technical innovation and delivered increased flexibility. As the cable is also [Openreach] PIA-approved, Fibrus has been able to use existing poles and ducts in the areas, with no need to dig or put up new ones.”

However, while Fibrus have been making good progress, the contradictory figures did seem a bit high given the expected slowdown in build from recent developments (here and here) and the fact that they only recently reported having passed 339,000 premises on 31st January 2024 (here) – falling to 321,000 for those deemed Ready for Service (RFS) by customers.

The operator’s co-founder and CEO, Dominic Kearns, was kind enough to clarify to ISPreview that both the 400k and 380k+ figures given by ACOME were incorrect. The actual figure for the end of March 2024 was 354,000 premises passed (337,000 RFS) and most of that comes from Northern Ireland (including the 74,000 so far delivered via Project Stratum, which is currently “on time and within budget”).