Tim Peters is the Sales Director at ECO Matters. Following a successful career as a Commercial Director working on projects with local authorities, Tim has now turned his attention to Ultra-Fast Fibre broadband and its delivery to blocks of flats and apartments.
Broadband: Rolling out Ultra-Fast Fibre
ECO Matters specialise in working with companies who manage privately owned blocks of flats. Until recently, we exclusively worked on providing free loft and cavity Insulation under the ECO obligation that the government introduced to the Energy Companies.
Working with managing agents, freeholders and residents management companies, ECO Matters have recently been selected as one of only two private organisations to work with Openreach on their Obligation to roll out Ultra-Fast fibre across the UK.
What is Ultra-Fast Fibre?
The average speed of broadband across the UK is currently 46 Mbps. The main constraint being that whilst fibre optic cable has been installed in the street up to the green box, the connection to 27 million properties is still reliant on the existing copper cable, which lacks the same efficiency and durability as Fibre. The longer the distance from the telephone exchange to the Street cabinet and from the cabinet to a building, the weaker the data signal becomes.
A full fibre infrastructure is an entirely different proposition. It is not distance limited for data in the same way. There are no street cabinets and the building will be connected by a fibre link all the way from the telephone exchange to the apartments. That link can carry massive amounts of information (as pulses of light) over far greater distances than copper, without any discernible loss in signal. Because fibre cables are so small, they can be installed in buildings in an unobtrusive way. This gives people the option of the upgrade to FTTP, which will bring speeds of 1Gbps. This will also bring increased reliability and fewer faults on the line.
What is the ‘Obligation’?
Openreach has initially been targeted with installation to 3 million homes by 2021. Clive Selley, Openreach CEO has great faith in his organisation and believes that the right thing to do is to install as quickly as possible. Clive has pledged to be ahead of the game and to install to 4 million homes before the end of the first milestone.
Where premises are serviced Overhead (via a telegraph pole), Openreach will simply be able to run additional cabling to the target properties without needing to access the inside of a building.
Blocks of flats though tend to be more challenging and Openreach need to gain access to the property to be able to upgrade the service. To do this agreement has to be made. ECO Matters are working with clients who manage or own blocks of flats in this latter category to identify properties that are within reach of existing FTTP infrastructure and building up a database of stock that assists Openreach in the decision making process of which areas they should prioritise in their timeline plan.
In areas that are not remote, the installations will be made by Openreach free of charge.
Target areas
Openreach is rolling out FTTP on a geographic basis. London, Manchester, Leeds, Glasgow, Bristol, Exeter and Salisbury are the immediate areas of focus. However, there are also 42,000 other postcodes where there is already fibre to the door and this coverage is growing every day.
Also, if we can provide Openreach with enough volume in areas they can access, they will review their plans and see if they can accommodate the demand.
What are the benefits?
1. A faster more reliable connection
As a society, we are increasingly reliant on the internet. Just three years ago, we used less than half the data we do today on our home broadband. We now have connected homes. Toasters, fridges, heating, doors and alarms are all linked to the internet and controlled by our mobile phones. We need to have greater capacity to deal with everyday life. In fact, 78% of people say that slow broadband would put them off renting or buying a property.
Older relatives want the ability to face time or skype relatives and friends as their mobility or health is becoming an issue.
Doctors Surgeries use the internet to book appointments and health workers can skype patients instead of calling sick people in, thus saving time and preventing the spread of germs.
Schools have extensive need of the internet as a teaching and administrative aid.
The Ultra-Fast Fibre download speeds will allow faster upload speeds for gaming and a 2 hour 4K definition film can be downloaded in 15 minutes.
2. Open Network
This is an important point to take away, there is no requirement for residents to use British Telecom. The resident will be able to select or retain whichever supplier they choose.
3. Nationwide infrastructure
Openreach already has a significant nationwide infrastructure, which runs to 165 million kilometres of cable which it manages and maintains. As such, there is little need to dig up roads and pavements. This only tends to occur where other service providers have dug and damaged the cable or tree roots have caused a problem. Openreach competitors do not have the same historic footprint and consequently must undertake significantly more digging to get their cable in.
4. Download speeds on your blocks CCTV are enhanced and speeded up.
5. Working from home will be as effective as working in the office.
6. All legal work will be taken care of by the British Telecom/Openreach team.
Rural FTTP roll out
As with all obligations, often rural and outlying areas are the most difficult to access and in many cases, the resident must pick up a bill for the laying on of the service.
However, DCMS has launched the latest strand in its plans to get the UK to 100% full fibre coverage by 2033 and this revolves around a £200 million fund that will be used to deliver FTTP to public buildings in rural areas and support a voucher scheme that residents and business can access to help them to get a full fibre service.
The rural gigabit voucher scheme will offer up to £1,500 for residents and £3,500 for small business to encourage take-up of FTTP services.
Process
Get in touch with our team and provide us with a list of postcodes to properties you would like to have FTTP installed to. We will check the infrastructure options available and produce a detailed proposal of our solution for review.
Following the survey and with the Wayleave agreement in place, Openreach will schedule an installation on an agreed date.
If you are having a building refurbished, this is a great time for the install work to be done and to enhance residents experience.
