Fibre rollout appears to be going well, with the majority of UK homes and businesses able to access gigabit-capable broadband. But there is still much confusion around what exactly terms like ‘full fibre’ mean, and adoption still lags behind international partners even as businesses turn to greater bandwidths than ever before to undergo digital transformation.
Moreover, many rural businesses aren’t being catered to by large network providers, and as they remain on copper lines, wonder if alternative providers might hold the keys to connectivity. This week, we talk to David Tomalin, Group Chief Technology Officer at CityFibre, to discuss the UK’s broadband infrastructure and what businesses can look to gain from the network in the near future.
Highlights
“Yes, absolutely, worker happiness is absolutely fundamental. We see at the moment, across the industry, high churn rates as we've come out of the COVID constraints, and people are working, looking for that more balanced working life environment. And that's, there's not nothing wrong with that, but it's about us embracing it as a country, as a community of industries. Because we absolutely have to close that UK productivity gap.”
“I think that the market is never competitive enough. We, again, it goes back to what is in our DNA: our DNA is to be a competitor. Why are we successful? It's because we are competitive, but we need to keep our edge. And the only way that we can keep our edge is having other competitors in the market to keep up that creative tension.”
“we have got the potential to ensure that the telecoms infrastructure in the UK is no longer the constraint upon our society. The investment that we're putting in the technology that it enables, should unlock a potential of opportunity for everyone, in every walk of life, to endeavour to their maximum potential as an individual, and as a business. And I think that is transformational, compared to any other time over the last two or three decades in the telecoms history of the UK.”
Read the full transcript here.
Footnotes
- CityFibre network passes 2 million homes on its march toward 8 million
- UK fibre rollout lags considerably behind developed nations, needs 'more ambition' to compete globally
- CityFibre raises alarm over UK telecoms overbuilding that could lead to broadband market regression
- 7 million homes to be connected to fibre in new joint venture network
- Prodapt aims to improve regional fibre choice with OpenFibreXchange launch
- Market consolidation – like Virgin Media O2 – is proving costly for the customer
- Five reasons why digital transformation is essential for business growth
- Half of UK premises now have access to gigabit broadband
- Yorkshire businesses first to trial cost-cutting water pipe broadband
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