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As Olympics get closer super-fast broadband goes live in PortlandFeb 07, 2012 (M2 PRESSWIRE via COMTEX) -- Super-fast broadband is now available to nearly 6,000 homes and businesses in Portland, BT announced today. Local householders and firms in the town have joined Wimborne and Boscombe in the high speed revolution, taking the number of premises in Dorset with access to the technology to nearly 26,000. And further major investment is under way. Super-fast broadband has also just started to become available in Broadstone and BT has announced plans for its new super-fast network to pass another 100,000 premises in Dorset later this year, including Weymouth, Bournemouth, Poole, Dorchester, Ferndown, Blandford and Verwood. BT's local network business, Openreach, expects to make super-fast fibre broadband available to around two-thirds of UK homes and businesses by the end of 2014*. It will use a mix of fibre to the cabinet (FTTC) and fibre to the premises (FTTP) technologies. Both offer speeds much faster than those currently available to many UK homes and businesses. FTTC, where fibre is delivered to the street cabinet, offers download speeds of up to 40Mbps and upload speeds of up to 10Mbps. Openreach is planning to roughly double these speeds this year. FTTP, where fibre runs all the way to homes and businesses, currently offers download speeds of up to 100Mbps and these are expected to be boosted to up to 300Mbps from the Spring. Michael Dunn, BT's South West regional manager, said: "The arrival of super-fast broadband in Portland and Broadstone is a huge boost for local businesses and households in this Olympic year. These are economically challenging times and super-fast broadband can transform their experience of the internet. They're joining the more than seven million UK premises now passed by one of the world's fastest growing fibre networks. "Fast and reliable internet connections are an essential part of our national infrastructure, whether we want them for boosting our businesses, delivering essential public services , education online or entertainment at home. Nobody is doing more than BT to roll-out faster broadband across the region and we want to go further." BT also plans to provide super-fast broadband free to all 550 athletes and officials staying at the Olympic Sailing venue at Portland during the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games. It is part of an agreement between BT, the London 2012 Organising Committee (LOCOG) and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to provide BT Infinity broadband free to around 19,000 athletes and officials in the UK. BT will deliver the service as part of its role as the official communications services partner for London 2012. The availability of super-fast fibre broadband at the athletes' apartments will allow them to keep in touch easily with their friends and family. Internet users with a super-fast connection can do much more online, all at the same time. Upload speeds are the fastest in the UK and can deliver a major boost to the competitiveness of local businesses, offering them new ways of working flexibly and allowing large data and video files to be sent and received almost instantly. Other benefits include wider use of high quality videoconferencing and faster back-up of computer systems. At home a family could be simultaneously downloading a movie, watching a TV replay service, surfing the internet and playing games online. A music track can be downloaded in about two seconds, a whole album in 30 seconds and a feature length HD movie in 10 minutes, whilst high-resolution photos can be uploaded to Facebook in seconds. Unlike other companies, Openreach offers access to all service providers on an open, wholesale basis, thereby underpinning a competitive market. For further information on Openreach's super-fast broadband programme visit www.superfast-openreach.co.uk Notes to editors * BT's deployment plans are subject to an acceptable environment for investment. Due to the current network topography, and the economics of deployment, it is likely that some premises within the selected exchange areas will not initially be able to access fibre-based broadband. However, Openreach is actively looking at alternative solutions for these locations. ((M2 Communications disclaims all liability for information provided within M2 PressWIRE. Data supplied by named party/parties. Further information on M2 PressWIRE can be obtained at http://www.presswire.net on the world wide web. Inquiries to [email protected]. |