Bournemouth gets Sewer-based Fibre-optic Broadband connectivity

Sunny city Bournemouth will become UK's first city to experience fibre optic-based broadband, beating competing bids from Northampton and Dundee (arguably because there's not enough sunshine there).

This project, the biggest of its kind in Europe, will see Broadband-by-sewers pioneer, H2O install fibre optic cables all around the city and provide up to 100mbps speeds to businesses and consumers, all for only £30m.

The move is supported by Bournemouth Borough Council and will get other telecoms companies slightly concerned.

Indeed, it opens the possibility for other utilities companies to become telecoms providers on their own using network solutions provided by H2O or other similar competitors.

What H2O is putting on the table (or rather underground) is a mini version of BT's 21st Century Network which means that users could potentially get rid of their landlines and use voice over IP instead to make phone calls or to watch footie on their telly.

Fibrecity, as it is being coined, will eliminate associated inconveniences like costly road works, long delays and red tapes.

Work will start as from this November and will aim at providing nearly 90,000 homes with high speed connectivity.

For more ITProPortal.com coverage of H2O's broadband solutions, go here. Tags: Broadband, Government, Grid Computing/Ethernet