The UK’s largest independent full fibre network, CityFibre, has now connected its first Project Gigabit customers in Norfolk, bringing next-generation broadband speeds to homes and businesses that might otherwise have missed out. Project Gigabit is the government-funded programme to enable hard-to-reach communities to access fast, reliable gigabit-capable broadband.
One of the first households to be connected in Norfolk was Brian and Sarah Moore, who live in Newton St Faith. Previously, Brian and Sarah had a part-copper ‘FTTC’1 connection, delivering only 35Mbps download speed and 9Mbps upload speed. With such limited bandwidth, they both struggled to work from home and found it difficult to connect their smart-home devices.
Having switched to Vodafone Broadband using CityFibre’s full fibre network connection, they now receive download speeds of up to 910Mbps alongside upload speeds of up to 105Mbps. These are some of Vodafone’s fastest speeds and offer up to 26x faster for download and 11x faster for upload than Brian and Sarah’s previous broadband. Brian told CityFibre: “I ordered as soon as it was available, and our connection is now extremely fast.”
More customers are being connected as part of CityFibre’s work with Project Gigabit across Norfolk. Another customer, Martin Deltrice, is a keen amateur broadcaster based in Horsham St Faith. “Both latency and reliability need to be good when broadcasting over amateur radio, if you’re trying to have a conversation you can’t have the line keep dropping,” said Martin. “The internet now works beautifully. It just took one phone call and ten minutes for Octaplus to activate the new service, the installers were ten out of ten!”
The connections mark an important milestone for CityFibre, which is rolling out its 10Gbps-capable full fibre networks to over 1.3m subsidised and commercial premises in hard-to-reach homes through the Project Gigabit programme.
Minister Sir Chris Bryant said: “This government is committed to kickstarting economic growth and improving the lives of working people. Delivering reliable connectivity is a critical part of that mission.”
“By investing in broadband upgrades, we’re improving internet speeds in rural communities like Norfolk, helping people stay connected to their loved ones and opening up new opportunities for businesses.”
Simon Holden, Group Chief Operations Officer at CityFibre, said: “Project Gigabit is a real victory for residents and businesses across Norfolk and will future-proof digital infrastructure for years to come, as well as delivering faster speeds, greater reliability and a much better digital experience to people today.”
Cllr. Jane James, cabinet member for Corporate Services and Innovation at Norfolk County Council said: “It’s great to see the first customers connected via the Project Gigabit rollout in Norfolk. Access to extremely fast and reliable full fibre is incredibly important to our residents and businesses and will transform the way people live and work in these rural communities.”
ENDS
Notes to Editors
1Fibre to the cabinet (FTTC). This type of connection uses both fibre and copper to connect homes and businesses.
On Friday 30th August, local dignitaries including Cllr Jane James, cabinet member for corporate services and innovation with Norfolk County Council, met with CityFibre, BDUK and some of the first connected customers to celebrate the project going live in the area.
Martin Deltrice runs a local bakery and is subpostmaster at his local Post Office with his partner Adrienne Gollard. Their full fibre connection is for the home only, at a symmetrical speed of 150Mbps.
Their previous download speed was on average 35-40Mbps download speed, with around 9Mbps upload speed. This was based over a 4G network, which Martin said “suffered from packet loss and latency issues.”
About CityFibre:
CityFibre is the UK’s largest independent Full Fibre infrastructure platform, providing carrier-neutral digital infrastructure to its wholesale customers and enabling ultra-fast, reliable and futureproof broadband, ethernet and 5G services to serve homes and businesses as well as schools, hospitals and GPs surgeries.
CityFibre’s Full Fibre network rollout programme targets up to a third of the UK market; representing up to 8m homes, 800k businesses, 400k local authority sites and 250k 5G access points. CityFibre has already announced 285 cities, towns and villages that will receive a transformational digital upgrade as part of the nationwide rollout.
As the only 100% Full Fibre wholesale network in the UK, CityFibre is trusted by major Internet Service Providers and mobile operators including TalkTalk, Three, Vodafone and Zen as well as a new generation of smaller regional ISPs dedicated to delivering Full Fibre Broadband.
CityFibre is based in London and is owned by funds managed by Antin Infrastructure Partners and Goldman Sachs Asset Management, Mubadala Investment Company, Interogo Holding and Newlight Partners.
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