Pure fibre ISP B4RN has announced that it’s now got over 800 paying customers.
The self-funded rural broadband project offers customers access to gigabit FTTP (Fibre to the Premises) broadband for just £30/month.
Based in Lancashire, the project has recently crossed over into Yorkshire following interest from communities around Bentham.
B4RN chief executive Professor Barry Forde revealed that the network is adding between 50-100 new premises every month. Forde expects that B4RN will have 1,000 customers connected by Easter and over 2,000 by the end of 2015.
Unconvinced that the local BDUK (Broadband Delivery for the UK) would deliver the superfast goods to the most remote parts of Lancashire, local residents including University of Lancaster professor Forde, decided to build their own network.
While most homes and firms connected by the BT-backed BDUK schemes can get top download and uploads of 76Mbps and 19Mbps via FTTC (Fibre to the Cabinet) lines, B4RN’s pure fibre lines provide download and upload speeds of 1,000Mbps.
As well as connecting 800 customers to quadruple-digit speeds, work has also finally recommenced in Dolphinholme, where complications involving a road crossing had halted progress.
Back in November, the B4RN network hit 600 customers and announced that it was applying for Ofcom Code Powers, which would give workers the ability to lay fibre ducts in public areas without applying for permission from the council.
Dolphinholme has been under the spotlight ever since it was announced that BT was deploying its own FTTP connections in the area, under the £62.5m Superfast Lancashire project.
The historic village, with a population of around 500, has the distinction for having not one but two ISPs setting up competing fibre to the premises networks.
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