Broadband in the U.K. Still Ahead of Forecast

Contrary to the claims made by some ISPs, Point Topic believes that the U.K. broadband market is holding up well in the face of the slowdown.   BT’s (News - Alert) numbers for the total number of broadband lines in the U.K. at the end of June was 16,735,000. This figure is a clear 225,000, or 1.3 percent ahead of Point Topic’s forecast made in November 2007.

That forecast was based on the market’s historic performance and took no special account of changing economic conditions.  But it did predict a sharp reduction in broadband growth, from 2.9 M to 2.0 M.  The actual figure turned out to be 2.2 M.

Tim Johnson, Chief Analyst: "The reasons for the drop are simple. The number of dial-up homes ripe for migration to broadband is dwindling, there is barely a million left and they are an increasingly resistant minority. At the same time, the ISPs are making slow progress in winning over the 9.6 million households that are still without internet access at all.  The fall in new broadband subscribers is therefore entirely predictable on the basis of these trends, and in fact sales have been slightly better than historic performance suggested."