Early indications suggest that the London 2012 Olympic Games opening ceremony and weekend events failed to put any real strain upon national UK broadband providers. Several ISPs reported increased internet usage, yet none suffered any serious problems. But the first real test could come today.
Network optimisation firm Riverbed Technology has predicted that almost two-thirds of UK inhabitants will watch this summer’s London 2012 Olympic Games online and, according to their OnePoll study, the Men’s 100m Sprint Final is set to be the most popular event among 55% of respondents. But what about Women’s beach volleyball?
Rochdale-based UK ISP Zen Internet has unveiled its strategy for coping with the “massive amount of demand for bandwidth” (e.g. from online video streaming services) and related concerns during the forthcoming London 2012 Olympic Games, which will begin at the end of this month.
The UK government’s Cabinet Office, which in February 2012 controversially warned that broadband ISP “services may be slower during the [London 2012 Olympic Games] or in very severe cases there may be drop outs” (guidance pdf), has now reversed its warning and said that it does not expect any impact upon the UK internet infrastructure.
BT has today confirmed that it’s still on-track to offer 500,000 wireless internet access hotspots across London in time for the 2012 Olympic Games, which will be mostly delivered via their FON wifi community of retail broadband ISP subscribers. The telecoms operator claims that 475,000 hotspots are already live in Greater London.
Business ISP Fluidata, which earlier this year warned of the potential danger from an increase in office internet traffic during this year’s 2012 London Olympic Games (here), has today revealed how its own broadband network will cope with the event. A major £2.4M upgrade has also been announced.
Metronet UK, which claims to run the country’s most advanced hybrid wired and wireless broadband network, has warned that some businesses could face a “crippling” impact upon their office networks as a result of the “anticipated bandwidth headaches” that are expected to stem from this summer’s London 2012 Olympic Games event.