Hyperoptic to expand 1Gb/s network with £ 21 million EIB backing

POLICY

Independent UK ISP Hyperoptic is currently rolling out a 1Gb/s Fibre-to-the-Premise broadband network to some 500,000 homes in 20 cities. The company recently secured a £21m European Investment Bank loan to support this.

Jonathan Taylor

EIB VICE PRESIDENT

Hyperoptic has been growing its network reach by over 100% per year in the past few years and will continue its current pace of growth within existing cities and expanding by opening new ones. Hyperoptic aims to cover 500,000 premises in 2018.

In 2013, Quantum Strategic Partners Ltd. (Quantum) invested £50 million in the ISP. The total investment of more than £75 million secured to date will be used to expand the network, with a focus upon covering MDUs and office blocks in urban areas.

Targeted support

Over the last five years the EIB has provided some €13 billion to improve broadband and telecommunications across Europe. The new 8-year EIB investment in Hyperoptic represents the largest ever dedicated backing for an Internet network investment in the UK. EIB Vice President, Jonathan Taylor said “The European Investment Bank is pleased to support Hyperoptic’s roll-out of super-fast broadband in cities across the UK. This exciting new initiative will transform economic activity, healthcare, education and access to key services and represents the EIB’s first targeted support to address slow communications in UK.”

About Hyperoptic

Hyperoptic delivers services over its own dedicated fibre network, which means customers can always connect to the Internet at the speeds advertised. The company’s award-winning services are currently available to consumers and businesses in 20 UK cities and towns. Founded in 2011, the company was recognised for ‘Best Superfast Broadband’ award at the 2016 Internet Service Providers’ Association awards for the fourth consecutive year.

hyperoptic.com

“The IT revolution offers our society a unique opportunity to significantly enhance productivity, if implemented properly,” explains Wolter Lemstra. “Telecom and communications infrastructure – specifically fibre broadband - play a vital role in this. Infrastructure-based competition is vital to developing broadband access, but we should also recognize the limits of the market-driven model. For this reason, governments have a vital role to play wherever commercial models fail to supply broadband.”

“Research also suggests that the economic benefits of broadband will only materialize if investments in ICT hardware and software are complemented with investment in human capital - skills development - and the reconceptualization of business models and business processes.”

Wolter first encountered FTTH in 1991, during a pilot carried out by telco incumbent KPN in The Netherlands. At the time, the obvious choice was to use existing copper networks and avoid the expense of laying new cables in the ground. The data rates fibre offered seemed excessive. “Today, however, they’re absolutely necessary. Video is one important bandwidth-hungry driver. Not just watching or downloading content, but also applications such as teleconferencing or security surveillance. The Internet of Things may have modest speed requirements, but there are billions of them. Moreover, upcoming applications such as remote surgery, that need extremely low latency and high data speeds, will increase the need for fibre even further. Trying to extend the life of copper networks is not a long-term solution.”

“Of course, the provider makes the final decision regarding the choice of technology, but governments have a duty to inform and educate and stimulate the uptake of the most future-proof solution. If the government finances a network, for example in a rural area, they can decide which technology is most appropriate. Across Europe, we see great diversity in alternative approaches to using fibre, based on initiatives by municipalities, non-telco entrepreneurs, cooperatives and user communities. We advise national, regional and local governments how to leverage and facilitate these initiatives.”

“In several Central and Eastern European countries which had little or no copper networks to start with they went directly to fibre. And once fibre is available, people tend to use more bandwidth. Today, people in Japan and Korea use far higher data rates than Europeans, but interestingly if current trends continue, it looks as if that gap will be closed by 2020.”