What is Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland? Officially the fastest broadband region of the UK

What is Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland?

NI officially the fastest broadband region of the UK

What is Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland? NI Officially the fastest broadband region of the UK Ofcom has announced that Northern Ireland is officially the fastest broadband region of the UK.

Figures from Ofcom’s Infrastructure Report 2012 show that the average download speed in Northern Ireland is 14.4Mbps, above the overall UK average of 12.7Mbps.

What’s more is that Northern Ireland is also the best connected region of the UK. Compared to the UK average of 65 per cent, a staggering 95 per cent of homes and businesses in Northern Ireland can access broadband services that deliver speeds of more than 30Mbps.

The figures also show that Wales is officially the slowest region with an average speed of 9.9Mbps and that just 37 per cent of Wales has access to speeds above 30Mbps.

Scotland follows in third place with an average speed of 12.1Mbps and 45 per cent coverage while England has up a slightly better average speed of 12.9Mbps with a wider coverage of 68 per cent – slightly above the UK average.

Jonathan Rose, Director of Ofcom Northern Ireland said: “Consumers are beginning to reap the rewards from the significant investment by the Executive and telecoms companies.

“The expansion of the fibre optic network across Northern Ireland means the region has a telecommunications infrastructure which is the envy of many other countries.”

November 20, 2012

Previous news stories about Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland

NI officially the fastest broadband region of the UK
More than 100,000 Northern Ireland locations now connected to fibre broadband
Belfast cross-city WiFi bid needs citizen support

What is Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland?

Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland is a joint venture co-founded by BT and the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment (DETI).

BT has invested £29.8 million in the project while the DETI has provided £18 million. An additional £1.5 million of funding has come from the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development (DARD), under the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD) Rural Development Programme.

So far, £21 million of the money has been earmarked for rural development. Over 70 per cent of the new street cabinets were set up for rural broadband in Northern Ireland, with over 3,000 kilometres of fibre being dug and installed in rural areas.

Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland has been running FTTC (Fibre to the Cabinet) connections to homes and businesses since 2008. A high point of the project so far has seen Derry become the only city in the UK to have 100 per cent FTTC coverage.

How fast will Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland be?

The aim with Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland, as is the case with the rest of the UK, is that at least 90 per cent of homes and businesses in the country will have access to superfast broadband – defined here as speeds above 24Mbps – by 2015.

Right now Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland claims downloads speeds of up to 80Mbps and upload speeds of 20Mbps.

The remaining 10 per cent will at speeds of at least 2Mbps with those living in areas not reached or reachable by fibre broadband or ADSL copper wire having broadband services delivered via satellite broadband.

Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland will be using Onwave Ltd to provide satellite broadband coverage.

Fibre broadband lines using FTTC will also be upgradeable to FTTP (Fibre to the Premises) once BT completes its trial of FTTP On Demand. While FTTP On Demand won’t be part of Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland’s plans, it should be live by late Spring/Summer 2013, so those homes and businesses who want to upgrade, and ISPs that want to offer it to their customers should be able to.

Where will Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland arrive next?

To find out when Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland will be deploying in your area, use this telephone number checker to see if you’re able to order in next-broadband for your home or business.

Is Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland BT only?

BT is the only company that’s doing the digging and Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland is being delivered via BT-owned street cabinets and exchanges.

However the Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland network is an Open Access Network, meaning that other ISPs including Sky, TalkTalk, Zen Internet, AAISP, Entanet and Claranet SOHO can offer their services. The full list of ISPs using Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland includes:

186k Limited
AAISP
BT
Eclipse
Fastnet
ICUK
Internet Central
Merula
Murphx
O-Bit Telecom
Plusnet
Redstone
Sky
Timico
TalkTalk
UTV
Vispa
Zen Internet

Previous news stories about Superfast Broadband Northern Ireland

More than 100,000 Northern Ireland locations now connected to fibre broadband

BT has announced that over 100,000 locations in Northern Ireland are now making use of superfast broadband, accessing speeds of up to 80Mbps.

This puts Northern Ireland at the forefront of broadband coverage, currently at 90 per cent, for all of Europe, let alone the rest of the UK.

November 1, 2012

Belfast cross-city WiFi bid needs citizen support

Belfast has won £6 million of funding to develop a city-wide WiFi network.

The money, which comes from the UK’s Super Connected Cities Fund, will be used to set up WiFi coverage across key locations in the city as well as provide 100Mbps speeds to businesses that need it.

In order to win additional support for this to happen, the Lord Mayor of Belfast Alderman Gavin Robinson is encouraging residents to voice their support for city-wide WiFi as there needs to be a clear public demand in order for more cash to be released.

The plan is to shoot for £7.7 million to build the ambitious city network, which Belfast aims to have set up and in place by 2015.

June 12, 2012