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RSS feedsBT Openreach has picked Muswell Hill in London and Whitchurch in South Glamorgan as the first two sites for a pilot of fibre-to-the-cabinet (FTTC) beginning in summer 2009.
"This is part of our £1.5bn investment in optical fibre deployments, and the sites were chosen in consultation with comms providers, ISPs, Regional Development Associations and because of the topology of the exchange. Basically they ticked all the right boxes," said a BT spokesman.
The telco added that a more technically focused trial at Kesgrave's Foxhall exchange in Suffolk in early 2009 would preface the deployments taking place during the summer.
Rob Bamforth, principal analyst for communication, collaboration and convergence at Quocirca, said: "It would have been nice to have seen more than two pilots, especially as Openreach said that the Regional Development Associations were involved. I'm concerned that they're not planting enough seeds."
BT said that the Muswell Hill and Whitchurch pilots will both involve up to 15,000 customer premises and that there would be a certain amount of "digging up the roads" but that this should not be hugely disruptive.
"Service providers will be out and about trying to get customers interested and excited about this. It will be the ones you'd expect, like Carphone Warehouse, Sky, Tiscali and BT Retail," said the BT spokesman.
Optical fibre will be installed to the cabinet from where the standard copper wiring will connect to residential customers. This will offer "headline speeds of up to 40Mbit/s", according to BT Openreach.
The amount BT Openreach will charge ISPs for the wholesale service has still to be determined. "That will be sorted out in discussions with Ofcom and the rest of the industry," said the spokesman.
David Campbell, next-generation access director at BT Openreach, said that detailed plans for the initial market deployment of the Openreach product would be announced in early 2010.
See also:
While other European countries are pressing ahead with fibre rollouts, progress in the UK is being held back as the debate over who will foot the bill drags on, writes Dave Bailey 02 Oct 2008
Broadband Stakeholder Group fibre rollout costings make grim reading 08 Sep 2008Plan will deliver 100Mbit/s broadband to 10 million homes by 2012, if Ofcom creates the right regulatory framework 15 Jul 2008
Connection speeds of 100 Mbit/s will arrive in 2015, if current market conditions prevail 12 Mar 2008All Telecoms Tags: Bt-openreach, Optical-fibre, Ofcom, Bt, Fttc, Fibre-to-the-cabinet, Communications, Hardware, Internet
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