Virgin Media UK and Nexfibre Build Full Fibre to 12,000 Exmouth Homes
Network operator nexfibre and retail ISP partner Virgin Media (O2) have today confirmed that they’ve made their 2Gbps speed Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband network available to more than 12,000 homes in the port town of Exmouth (near Exeter in Devon, England) for the first time.
The move means that most premises will now have a choice between three gigabit-capable broadband networks, with Exmouth already being well covered by full fibre lines from both Openreach (BT) and AllPoints Fibre (Jurassic Fibre). In addition, OFNL also caters for a small patch of new build homes within the area. But there are still a few sizeable patches with little overbuild between all three.
Nexfibre itself has already covered 2 million premises across the UK with their new full fibre network (here) and many more will follow. Just for some context. Telefónica, Liberty Global and InfraVia Capital Partners originally set up the new £4.5bn nexfibre joint venture in 2022 (here), which aims to deploy an open access fibre network to reach “up to” 7 million UK homes (starting with 5m by 2026) in areas NOT currently served by Virgin Media’s network of 16m+ premises. The funding reflects £3.3bn of fully underwritten financing and up to £1.4bn in equity commitments.
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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.
What has been the timescale on this for the buildout being started to the point where they are making the network available to customers? In the area where I live, they have been really moving on the install. It’s night and day to the speed that we’ve seen other companies build at (2 days for one road vs 2 weeks from another operator for the same houses).
Mark, is there any more news about the VMO2 wholesale offering? Since they announced it they seem to have maintained complete radio silence.
The last I recall was the planned ETA for this beginning was mid 2025. Whether this timeline has changed or not will remain to be seen.
Feel free to correct me if I am wrong.
How funny, it’s actually been live for the best part of a year! Guessing they’re closing this project off. It’s funny, I’d go for their 2Gbps package but they dropped my address and around 4-5 other houses on my street off their postcode checker and refuse to answer any questions around whether it’s available or not… they’re using Openreach poles on my street for the final run to the premises so it’s not like the route isn’t already there…
Yes, they switched strategies a few years back, and now only announce areas once the build has completed – rather than before it begins. Less to worry about with negative headlines over delays, perhaps.
VM do not do a phone line.
They do in coax areas, not in NF areas.
As for why, IDK but I wish they did along with a local DVR for their stream only TV service (TV360 also not being an option).
They don’t do a PSTN line on new coax connections, you get a VOIP service via the RJ11 ports on their superhub, an RJ11 to BT 631 type socket adapter is supplied.
“well covered by full fibre lines from both Openreach (BT) and AllPoints Fibre (Jurassic Fibre).”
Neither true – there are bits of both, but huge areas without either and Virgin has covered a lot of those not served by full fibre from either of them.