Some 238,000 homes and businesses will be connected to fiber
U.K. broadband provider Virgin Media announced an investment program to deploy fiber-to the-premise in Scotland.
Under the program, Virgin Media committed to connect at least two-thirds of the 360,000 additional homes and businesses being added to its broadband network in Scotland directly with FTTP technology. Virgin Media earlier this month said more than 50% of premises connected under its Project Lightning plans would benefit from FTTP.
Virgin Media, owned by Liberty Global, is expanding its fiber optic infrastructure across the U.K. as part of a 3 billion pound ($3.7 billion), U.K.-wide investment known as “Project Lightning.” The main goal of the initiative is to expand coverage to an additional 4 million homes and business, pushing total reach to 17 million premises. In Scotland, the broadband provider said it reaches 1 million homes and businesses. Virgin Media also said more than one-third of the additional homes and business will be available by the end of 2017.
The operator said U.K. telecom regulator Ofcom recently reported the region has the lowest proportion of fiber connections running directly to homes and businesses of any Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development nation and Scotland has the lowest broadband speeds in the U.K.
“Scotland will benefit first from our plans to accelerate the rollout of fiber broadband. This private investment will give people in Scotland the broadband boost they deserve and help to drive economic growth,” said Virgin Media CEO Tom Mockridge. “We urge local councils and landlords to work with us to ensure this expansion happens as quickly as possible.”
Virgin Media provides fixed and mobile telephony services as well as broadband across the U.K. and Ireland.
U.K. telecommunications operator BT’s network business unit Openreach recently announced plans to expand its FTTP network. Openreach said its wholesale FTTP network currently passes more than 327,000 homes and businesses across the U.K., and expects its network to reach nearly 2 million homes and businesses by 2020.
