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Three UK and Virgin Media O2 Partner to Launch RCS Business Messaging

27th Jan, 2025 (10 Comments)

Mobile operators Three UK and O2 (Virgin Media) have today announced that they’re partnering with the cloud communications platform, Sinch, to make RCS Business Messaging (RBM) available on iOS (Apple iPhone, iPad etc.) for their customers – previously this was only available to Android based phones and devices.

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Freshwave Deploy 4G Mobile to Firms in London Skyscraper 8 Bishopsgate

27th Jan, 2025 (5 Comments)

Wireless infrastructure provider Freshwave has teamed-up with Electracom Projects to deliver a 4G mobile signal – from all four mobile network operators (MNOs) – to the 50-storey ‘8 Bishopsgate’ development in the City of London (CoL), which will benefit local businesses inside the property.

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Broadband Networks Zzoomm and FullFibre Limited Agree UK Merger

27th Jan, 2025 (14 Comments)

Alternative broadband network builders Zzoomm and FullFibre Limited (Fibre Heroes), both of which have been rolling out multi-gigabit speed capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) ISP networks across different parts of the United Kingdom, have this morning announced that they’ve agreed to merge to create one of the UK’s largest Altnets.

Data Suggests Storm Eowyn Caused Severe Decline in UK Mobile Connectivity

27th Jan, 2025 (7 Comments)

New data from Ookla, which runs the popular Speedtest.net broadband connection benchmarking service, has revealed that Storm Éowyn (pronounced ‘Ay-oh-win’) triggered a “rapid, severe and sustained decline” in mobile performance across all operators in Ireland and parts of the UK, particularly Northern Ireland and Scotland, on a “scale not seen before“.

Full Fibre Broadband Network Hyperoptic Suffers More UK Job Cuts

27th Jan, 2025 (10 Comments)

City-focused ISP Hyperoptic, which since 2011 has built an alternative full fibre (FTTP/B) network to reach “more than” 1.73 million homes in parts of 64 UK towns and cities, has informed its staff that 2025 will see a “reduced volume of work” and thus a potential reduction in their infrastructure teams of nearly 130 jobs (out of nearly 280 potentially impacted roles).

Mobile giant Vodafone UK and Sky (Comcast) have reportedly two among several "groups" that have approached budget conscious fixed broadband ISP TalkTalk about a potential deal (most likely an acquisition), which in theory could create a much larger provider with more influence over the industry. Just to recap. In 2020 TalkTalk became the subject of a £1.1bn takeover by Toscafund - controlled by hedge fund tycoon Martin Hughes (here), which including debt valued the broadband provider at around £1.8bn. The deal took the ISP private and gave them more financial flexibility for their future plans. Since then, they've backed Freedom Fibre (here) and this week made the notable acquisition of Ethernet provider Virtual1 (here). According to the FT (paywall) and Sky News, TalkTalk is now said to have asked investment bank Lazard to review its options after allegedly being approach by several groups, including Vodafone and Sky (Sky Broadband). Lazard is a logical choice as they recently acted as Financial Advisor to TalkTalk on the Virtual1 transaction. Some industry analysts have reportedly suggested that TalkTalk itself could now be worth "at least" £3bn. But this seems rather optimistic for an ISP that doesn't have any significant fixed line broadband infrastructure to call its own (excluding their old unbundled LLU network) and largely just piggybacks off Openreach (BT), CityFibre and Freedom Fibre. But TalkTalk do have a strong business and wholesale side. Funnily enough, Sky Broadband are in a similar position with their own fixed line base, while Vodafone also likes to piggyback off Openreach and CityFibre. At present, Vodafone has a fixed broadband base of 991,000 customers, while Sky Broadband is estimated to be home to around 6.7 million and TalkTalk has approximately 4.2 million. Suffice to say, anybody gobbling up TalkTalk would instantly become a much larger provider, giving them a greater say in how the UK broadband market develops and more opportunities for convergence (Vodafone with mobile, and Sky with mobile and TV). Crucially, TalkTalk's consumer base is mostly made up of those on older copper and hybrid fibre lines (i.e. ADSL and FTTC / VDSL2), which are ripe for a future migration to FTTP. At the time of writing, all of the aforementioned operators have decline to comment on the reports, and TalkTalk has yet to receive any serious formal offers. In other words, we strongly suspect that this is largely just an exercise in spin to help TalkTalk drum up some more productive interest in the idea. But at the same time, it's not unreasonable to suspect that they might succeed, as the interest seems genuine. On the other hand, we see reports like this every year or so and only a very few ever convert into a serious offer. Time will tell. Much may depend upon whether or not TalkTalk’s new owners are more flexible and pragmatic about doing a deal than the previous lot. Arguably, TalkTalk might have gone much further by now had they taken some different decisions a few years ago (e.g. co-investing in FTTP instead of Pay TV).

Budget Broadband ISP TalkTalk Probes Possible UK Data Breach

25th Jan, 2025 (9 Comments)

Customers of debt-troubled UK internet provider TalkTalk have been given an uncomfortable reminder of the 2015 cyberattack (here), which came after the ISP admitted that it was “investigating” reports on a cybercrime forum that alleged the provider had suffered a new data breach.

Police Arrest After Protestors Cut Vital Fibre Optic Cables in UK Cities

25th Jan, 2025 (34 Comments)

The City of London Police (CoLP) have arrested a 29-year-old man after a climate protest group claimed to have “[disrupted] the wifi systems of hundreds of insurance companies across the UK“, which they achieved by cutting key fibre optic cables in London (similar events are also said to have occurred in Leeds, Birmingham and Sheffield).

BT Urges Critical Infrastructure Providers to Get Off UK Copper Network

24th Jan, 2025 (79 Comments)

Telecoms giant BT has today “urged” providers of Critical National Infrastructure (CNI) to “move off” the “outdated copper network” as it is becoming “increasingly unstable“. BT claims its own data shows that 60% of CNI customers in the UK currently have no plan in place to start migrating off the legacy analogue network.

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Shire Fibre Seek Code Powers to Support Shropshire UK Full Fibre Rollout

24th Jan, 2025 (3 Comments)

A new alternative broadband network provider and ISP called Shire Fibre has today surfaced with a tentative plan to build their new Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) network across poorly served parts of Shropshire (England), starting with the small market town of Craven Arms (population of 2,300) and surrounding areas.

nPerf Name EE as the UK Fastest Mobile Network in 2025 Benchmark

24th Jan, 2025 (13 Comments)

Internet connection benchmarking firm nPerf has this morning published the results from their annual 2025 crowdsourced study into UK mobile broadband (4G, 5G) performance, which sees EE being named as the country’s best and fastest operator for mobile data performance. But Three UK still holds the top spot for 5G-only performance.

ITS Technology Launch 5Gbps Speeds via Ethernet over FTTP Service

24th Jan, 2025 (6 Comments)

The ITS Technology Group, which operates various wholesale full fibre broadband and Ethernet networks (“Faster Britain“) across urban parts of the UK for businesses and ISPs, has today introduced both 2.5Gbps and 5Gbps symmetric speed tiers on their “FibreLight” Ethernet over FTTP (EoFTTP) service.

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Broadband Altnet Toob Ranks 4th in Sunday Times 100 Tech List

24th Jan, 2025 (2 Comments)

Hampshire-based network builder and UK ISP toob, which has deployed a gigabit speed full fibre (FTTP) network across parts of South England and also harness some of CityFibre’s network, has placed 4th in the latest 2025 Sunday Times 100 Tech – a ranking of Britain’s fastest-growing private technology companies.

EE Miles Ahead of O2, Three UK and Vodafone for 5G Mobile Availability

24th Jan, 2025 (24 Comments)

Network benchmarking provider Ookla, which operates the popular Speedtest.net internet connection testing service, has kindly furnished ISPreview with some additional data that reveals the past and present levels of UK 5G mobile (mobile broadband) availability across EE (BT), Vodafone, Three UK and O2 (Virgin Media). Some of the results may surprise.

Openreach to Stop Selling 40Mbps FTTC Broadband Tier on 24th April

23rd Jan, 2025 (15 Comments)

Network access provider Openreach (BT) has today confirmed our report from last month (here) and revealed that they will withdraw, from new sale (provision), the once popular 40Mbps (2Mbps upload) tier for their Fibre-to-the-Cabinet (FTTC / VDSL2) based broadband ISP lines – effective from 24th April 2025.

Mobile Network Operator Three UK Suffers Calling Outage UPDATE7

23rd Jan, 2025 (36 Comments)

Some customers of mobile operator Three UK are this afternoon being impacted by a partial network outage, which is preventing them from making or recieving calls (this often returns a “call failed” message). But 999 (emergency) calls and data (mobile broadband) connectivity, including related IP based calls (e.g. WhatsApp), continue to function.

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Broadband Operators Warned to Brace for Storm Eowyn on Friday

23rd Jan, 2025 (4 Comments)

A number of network operators, such as Openreach (BT), have put out notifications to warn partners and customers about the expected impact of Storm Éowyn tomorrow morning. The named storm is expected to be particularly vicious when it strikes Ireland, which is why it’s generating some headlines online, although its impact upon the UK will still be nasty.

LONAP Internet Exchange Cuts UK Pricing of Port Fees

23rd Jan, 2025 (5 Comments)

The London Access Point (LONAP), which is a not-for-profit Layer 2 Internet Exchange Point (IXP) based in London that was first established in 1997 and works with various different members (broadband ISPs, CDNs, mobile operators etc.), appears to have responded to recent price cuts at LINX (here) by refreshing some of its own fees.