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The Government’s Building Digital UK (BDUK) agency, which oversees their £5bn Project Gigabit broadband roll-out and the Shared Rural Network (SRN) programme for upgrading 4G coverage in remote areas, has today published their combined annual progress report and accounts for the period 1st April 2024 to 31st March 2025. This also includes some data on the level of fraud in their programmes.

In terms of their progress on delivery of Project Gigabit, the new report doesn’t really add much to last month’s annual progress update, as it covers the same period of time (here). But it does also contain a lot more information about BDUK’s accounts and management (if that’s of any interest), although you’ll need to pick out your magnifying glass to scan across all 104 pages of it to find any interesting bits.

For example, the report acknowledges that “there is a risk that BDUK will not achieve its target of 99% gigabit-capable connectivity by 2032 due to supplier challenges, funding constraints, market conditions or deployment complexities” (this target was only recently delayed from 2030 to 2032).

A similar statement is also made about the SRN’s January 2027 completion target, with BDUK noting the “complex delivery challenges associated with very rural areas” and the fact that they do not have “direct contracting relationships with power and transmission suppliers and therefore relies on grant recipients to deliver outputs to necessary timescales.”

Something else we noted was the data on fraud and error controls within BDUK, which exist in most public programmes to help prevent abuse (e.g. abuse of public funding, such as in the gigabit voucher scheme), although a lot of the context is missing to help explain where this arises. The fact they stick fraud and errors together for a lot of combined figures is also a little annoying, but they do separate it out in other areas.

BDUK Figures on Fraud and Error

Our fraud and error audit has found (based on cumulative results since 2022 to 2023 to ensure the robustness of the sample) 0.9% of the sampled transactions were categorised as irregular with 0.7% being classified as Supplier Error and 0.1% being classified as Official Error. 0.1% were classified as Suspected Fraud. For the cases specifically identified as part of our audit work the main causes of error identified included:

Beneficiary eligibility;

Retrospective requests for vouchers, where the connection was delivered prior to the request for a voucher.

Based on this estimation the overall level of underlying fraud and error in the vouchers scheme for 2024 to 2025 is therefore estimated to be £650,700 (based on spend of £72,300,000), £72,300 of which would be suspected fraud. This aligns with the total detected and recovered fraud and error figures submitted through the 2024/25 Consolidated Data Return.

If we were to apply the above estimation to the £180,500,000 of spend on our Gigabit contracts there would be c.£1,624,500 of fraud and error, £180,500 of which would be suspected fraud. In future years we will focus more attention on fraud and error in our Gigabit contracts as they increase in spend and delivery. However, our detailed fraud risk assessments show this mechanism as being relatively low risk given the extensive contract management controls, processes and procedures in place.

The full report covers many more areas and so, if you’re interested in the inner workings of BDUK, then this is for you. On the other hand, if you’d much rather have a cup of tea and a biscuit, then you’ll probably save your sanity by not having to read through 104 pages of mostly political / economic waffle and statistics.

Finally, we should remind readers that the government are currently in the process of ending BDUK’s status as an executive agency and instead integrating it back into the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) from 1st November 2025 (here).

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Broadband ISP Virgin Media (O2) and network operator partner nexfibre, which share some of the same parentage, have today announced that they’ve once again expanded the reach of their symmetric 2Gbps speed full fibre (FTTP) network to more than 6,000 additional homes in the coastal South Wales town of Llantwit for the first time.

Assuming the operator actually means Llantwit Major (Llanilltud Fawr), then the deployment could be quite useful as the town is currently only partly covered by a gigabit-capable broadband network from Openreach, although alternative network ISP Ogi seems to have the strongest coverage across the area.

Nexfibre reflects a £4.5bn joint venture between Telefónica, Liberty Global and InfraVia Capital Partners (here). This has so far already covered around 2.4 million premises across the UK with their new full fibre network, which is being built by Virgin Media’s engineers. But the operator’s original plan to cover “up to” 7 million UK homes (starting with 5m by 2026) in areas NOT currently served by Virgin Media’s network of 16m+ premises was recently dealt a blow by Telefonica’s strategic review (here).

The network operator now only expects to reach 2.5 million UK premises by the end of 2025 and uncertainty remains over what comes next. But Virgin Media has recently announced the creation of a new fixed wholesale until, which will enable retail ISPs to harness both of their FTTP networks (here) – currently available to a combined 7 million UK premises.

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News

Lynk Global and Omnispace have announced plans to merge, aiming to create a leading direct-to-device (D2D) satellite connectivity provider by combining key technological and spectrum assets. The merger would unite Omnispace’s 60 megahertz of globally coordinated S-band spectrum with Lynk’s multi-spectrum satellite technology platform, which is currently operational with five low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites offering intermittent messaging and alert services across several island nations.

The combined entity, backed strategically by Luxembourg-based multi-orbit operator SES, which is set to become a major shareholder, intends to utilise this S-band spectrum aligned with international 3GPP standards for non-terrestrial networks. This move will deliver enhanced D2D and Internet of Things (IoT) connectivity solutions. These services are targeted at mobile network operators (MNOs), enterprises, government users, and commercial sectors worldwide, signalling a significant expansion in satellite-based mobile communications offerings.

Omnispace, headquartered in Washington, D.C., initially planned to deploy a constellation exceeding 600 satellites utilising its spectrum for global D2D coverage. However, its progress was hindered by interference issues reportedly related to the overlap with SpaceX’s spectrum usage in the U.S., particularly concerning T-Mobile’s cellular frequencies. According to Omnispace’s vice president of strategy and marketing, George Giagtzoglou, this interference was specific to the U.S. market, with expectations that a recent Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regulatory request by SpaceX could alleviate conflicts by aligning frequency usage with international S-band allocations.

Lynk CEO Ramu Potarazu expressed confidence that the merger provides the “right mix of technology, spectrum and leadership” to accelerate the delivery of seamless messaging, voice, and data services globally, extending coverage to commercial and industrial vehicles, governments, utilities, and consumer markets. Potarazu is slated to become CEO of the new combined entity, with Omnispace CEO Ram Viswanathan taking on the role of chief strategy officer.

This strategic pivot towards spectrum ownership marks a critical step for Lynk, which recently discontinued a planned public merger with Slam Corp., a special purpose acquisition company, following legal disputes that had constrained its capital-raising efforts. Instead, Lynk has been focusing on leveraging SES’s extensive satellite network in geostationary and medium Earth orbits and focused on a technology validation launch that will test new multi-orbit relay functions.

The timing of this merger also places Lynk and Omnispace alongside major industry competitors such as SpaceX and AST SpaceMobile, both actively securing satellite spectrum to bolster their D2D services. SpaceX is in the process of acquiring S-band spectrum rights from EchoStar (DISH), a deal reported to be valued at up to $17 billion in total considerations, which would significantly expand its licensed spectrum. The move is intended to grow its capacity from the modest 10 megahertz currently licensed through T-Mobile to a potential 50 megahertz for a next-generation service. Its constellation of over 650 Starlink satellites currently supports text messaging, emergency alerts, and select apps in specific markets.

Meanwhile, AST SpaceMobile, currently operating five test BlueBird LEO satellites, aims to scale rapidly with U.S. carriers AT&T and Verizon. It is pursuing various global spectrum agreements to provide higher-throughput satellite broadband, competing directly with the newly combined entity.

The Lynk-Omnispace merger is positioned to strengthen the landscape of D2D satellite communication by combining spectrum assets—Omnispace’s 60 MHz S-band and Lynk’s operational platform—with financial backing from SES. The companies anticipate finalising the transaction by late this year or early next year, subject to customary regulatory approvals. This consolidation reflects a growing industry trend where satellite firms seek to secure expansive, globally coordinated spectrum bands in order to deliver seamless, low-latency connectivity directly to consumer devices without relying solely on terrestrial cellular networks.

Total Telecom are testing AI tools for content generation. This article used Noah Newsroom, please let us know about any inaccuracy 

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A recent survey of 5,014 UK adult consumers, which was conducted by Which?, has claimed that the average broadband-only ISP customer could save £100 per year by switching to a new provider – rising to £160 and £155 on Sky Broadband and Virgin Media respectively. Similarly, those who haggled saved £65 (rising to £92 and £85 respectively on Virgin Media and BT).

The story is similar for mobile and TV customers. Mobile customers who switched operators and swapped to a SIM-Only deal were found to have saved an average of £258 a year, while those who stayed with their existing network and instead opted to haggle their way to a SIM-Only plan were able to save £210.

Across all types of mobile contracts, EE, O2 and Vodafone customers stood to make the biggest savings by switching away from their provider. Meanwhile, EE, O2 and Vodafone customers who left their current provider and switched to a different network or SIM-Only deal saved an average of £163, £127 and £121 respectively. Finally, out-of-contract TV and broadband customers could save an average of £169 by switching (rising to £237 on Sky TV), while haggling with an existing provider resulted in savings of £99.

However, it’s important to say that haggling is more likely to work with providers, particularly the biggest players (they have dedicated retentions departments), where discounting is a routine practice for attracting new and retaining existing customers. By comparison, smaller providers don’t traditionally offer big discounts to new customers and their prices may be more stable, thus haggling is less likely to return a positive result. Nevertheless, it’s always worth a try, and the worst thing they can say is “no”.

All of this is particularly relevant given the recent announcements from a number of broadband and mobile providers (e.g. BT – here and Virgin Media – here), which have increased the level of mid-contract price hikes they apply. For example, BT’s mid-contract hikes, which are applied from April each year, jumped from £3 to £4 (monthly). We’re expecting a number of other providers to soon follow suit, as per usual.

On the other hand, it’s now easier for consumers to switch providers than even before, thanks to systems like One Touch Switching (OTS) on broadband and Text-to-Switch (Auto-Switch) on mobile. Which?’s survey similarly discovered that most consumers found the switching process easy. This was the case for 80% of broadband and 79% of mobile customers, albeit falling to 69% for those with a broadband and TV bundle.

The main reason(s) people switched also varied by sector. Mobile customers switched for a better mobile deal with another provider (41%) or because they had issues with signal and reception (13%). By comparison, broadband customers switched to avoid slow speeds (21%) or an unreliable connection (16%), while broadband and TV bundlers looked for a new provider because of poor customer service (17%).

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News

The FCC took the initial step of revoking permission for Hong Kong Telecom (HKT) to continue providing telecom services in the United States.

By: Brad Randall, Broadband Communities

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has sent an order to Hong Kong Telecom (HKT) asking them to explain why revocation proceedings against HKT shouldn’t commence.

The FCC announced the development last week. It marks an initial step to revoke HKT’s ability to operate in the United States, the FCC said.

According to Chairman Brendan Carr, the order to HKT is the latest of the FCC’s efforts to unravel Chinese Communist Party involvement in U.S. telecom networks.

“As an affiliate of China Unicom—a provider that is already listed on the FCC’s Covered List due to national security concerns—the FCC’s action on HKT today is an appropriate step towards ensuring the safety and integrity of our communications networks,” Carr said through the FCC’s release. “The FCC will continue to
safeguard America’s networks against penetration from foreign adversaries, like China.”

A report, published by CNBC, said HKT acknowledged receiving the order.

The company further pledged to appropriately respond to relevant authorities, according to CNBC.

Scrutiny on Chinese telecoms is bipartisan

As the FCC’s release explains, the commission’s intensified focus on companies like HKT has continued with bipartisan support.

In addition to HKT, the FCC said they also directed HKT’s wholly owned subsidiaries to provide similar explanations regarding why their authority to operate in the U.S. should not be revoked.

Other companies to face denials, or revocations of the ability to operate in the U.S., have included China Mobile International (USA) Inc. in 2019 and China Telecom (Americas) Corp. in 2021.

The following year, along with China Unicom, Pacific Networks Corp. and ComNet (USA) LLC. in 2022 faced similar actions, the FCC said.

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The Senior MD at Macquarie, Oliver Bradley, has revealed that that one of the alternative broadband networks they support, Voneus, recently completed a renegotiation on their existing £70m debt facility over the summer. The move saw existing investors inject an unspecified amount of fresh funding to keep the operator going.

Some readers may recall that Voneus, not unlike many other altnets, has been struggling a bit recently with redundancies and a slowdown in their network build (here). This came after the operator also found itself having to withdraw (here) from their publicly funded Project Gigabit broadband roll-out contract for Mid West Shropshire (Lot 25.01), which was this month picked up by Openreach (here).

The company’s most recent accounts, which cover the year to 31st March 2024, revealed that turnover had increased by 34% to £4.417m, while gross profit shrank by -17% to £768.6k and total employees grew from 156 to 238. But Voneus’ loss before tax has also more than doubled to £36.65m (up from £14.83m), although their net assets have grown to be worth £93.43m (up from £23.32m).

However, a new report on TelcoTitans (paywall) reveals that Voneus appears to have quietly completed an important refinancing effort over the summer, which is a process that took around 3 months and involved some difficult negotiations with banks (creditors). The hope is that this will now enable the network operator to reach positive cash flow in the future.

Oliver Bradley indicates that this resulted in a sort of “amend and extend” agreement, wherein Voneus has been given some relief on the covenants it had agreed in securing the £70m debt facility, and an extension of the loan term by a number of years “to give us breathing room while we get to profitability and cash flow break even”.

In the meantime, details of how much extra funding has been injected alongside this remain unclear, although Voneus does confirm (Companies House) that the stated capital in terms of allotment of shares held by the company is now worth £131.48m (up from £110.68m a year earlier).

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Alternative network ISP Quickline, which is rolling out a new gigabit-capable full fibre (FTTP) and wireless (FWA) broadband network across rural parts of Yorkshire and Lincolnshire in England (3-Year Rollout Plan), has just extended their fibre network to three additional rural communities along the banks of the River Ouse – the villages of Swinefleet, Reedness and Whitgift.

The deployment, which represent just over 550 addresses served, forms part their £118.9m (public subsidy) East Riding of Yorkshire and Lincolnshire (Lot 23) contract under the government’s Project Gigabit programme; this was announced back in July 2024 (here) and aims to reach around 72,000 additional premises over the next few years.

Just to recap. Quickline’s network rollout is currently aiming to extend gigabit-capable broadband to a further 360,000 UK premises across thousands of rural communities (roughly 170k via publicly funded projects and almost 200k from commercial builds) and the provider hopes to end 2025 with a total of 200,000 premises passed.

Residential customers reached by their new full fibre network are typically charged from £22 per month on a 24-month term for 100Mbps (50Mbps upload) speeds with free installation, which goes up to £49 for their top 1000Mbps symmetric speed tier (you also get the first 8 months of service for free on their top tier).

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News

Researchers are aiming to optimise the networking technology for large crowds and to avoid surveillance

Monitoring the devices of protesters – or even shutting down networks entirely – has become a staple of authoritarian regimes around the world. From Myanmar to India to Bangladesh, denying connectivity to entire regions is a common tactic used to suppress unrest.

Now, however, as first reported by IEEE Spectrum, researchers from City College of New York, Harvard, and Johns Hopkins University are building a protype mesh network called Amigo that could keep protestors connected throughout a state-imposed internet blackout.

“Shutting down the Internet during times of great civil protest is a way to prevent people from being able to organize and come together,” said Tushar Jois, an assistant professor of electrical engineering at City College. “That is what we’re specifically tailoring our technology for.”

Mesh networks are a type of local area network (LAN) where multiple devices (nodes) connect directly to as many other nodes as possible to share data. In the context of protests, users’ smartphones operate as the nodes, dynamically connecting to devices in the local area and forwarding data through the chain to its intended recipient. In this way, the users form their own LAN, bypassing the need to connect to local wireless networks.

This decentralised networking technology – which has widespread applications in more conventional settings, such as for office WiFi – has been used by protesters for several years, but results have been mixed, with messages failing to deliver, appearing out of order, and allowing users to be traced. Part of the challenge, the researchers explain, is that when the mesh network comes under strain nodes within it can begin sending redundant messages, flooding the system.

The researchers’ new system, Amigo, overcomes this challenge by dynamically segmenting the network into ‘cliques’ based on their geographical position. Within a clique, each node may only communicate to a designated lead node, which then communicates the data to other lead nodes. This reduces the number of redundant messages sent, significantly reducing pressure on the network.

Amusingly, this system somewhat resembles the clandestine cell systems use by resistance groups for decades, whereby members of a cell could only communicate to the wider organisation through a local (typically anonymous) leader, who in turn is part of another more senior cell. This limits the number of members who could be betrayed if one were to be captured.

Another major consideration for Amigo is security. In the past, it has been difficult to remove compromised devices from encrypted groups on the mesh network, and older mesh standards also leaked compromising metadata.

According to Jois, Amigo is tackling these problems with new algorithms, ensuring outsider anonymity and group removal. It also features forward secrecy, which ensures past communications remain secure even if a long-term encryption key is compromised, and post-compromise security, allowing the system to automatically create a new key if the current key is exposed, blocking out the intruder.

According to Jois, the next step for Amigo involves the researchers getting closer to active protests to better understand protesters needs and explore how the network functions as protest evolves.

“[Researcher Cora Ruiz’s] current work is about determining communications dynamics and [group] dynamics by going to protest activists and journalists—in these places where Internet shutdowns are common—and figuring out what are their needs,” said Jois.

Keep up to date with all of the latest telecoms news from around the world with the Total Telecom newsletter

Also in the news
Connected Britain Award winners 2025 announced!
Netomnia announces ‘powerful and ambitious’ rebrand ahead of Connected Britain
VodafoneThree drops Samsung, relies on Nokia and Ericsson for £2bn network upgrade

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Interviews

At Connected Britain 2025 we sat down with Rob Atkinson from EY to explore the biggest challenges and opportunities facing the telecoms sector

The phrase ‘telco to techco’ has been one floating around the telecoms industry for many years now, but evidence of true transformation remains scarce.

According to Rob Atkinson, Partner, Telecommunications, Media and Technology leader at EY UK&I, most telcos on this journey today are not yet bold enough to push for a full reimagining of their current business model but are instead trying to tighten their focus and simplify their operations.

“The telcos are being more deliberate in the choices they are making – in some cases, between servco and netco,” said Atkinson. “They want to be asset right in the way that they apply themselves, so they’re not trying to be all things to all people.”

Of course, AI has a major role to play in this transformation journey, with industry optimism for the technology – particularly agentic AI – reaching fever pitch. But, as Atkinson points out, studies suggest 95% of AI pilots so far are currently failing. There is a major disconnect between the push for AI-powered customer experience and the reality of legacy IT systems hindering innovation.

“There’s no shortage of engagement – everyone knows there’s opportunity. But the way many organisations are not quite cutting through at the moment,” he said. “These organisations are not being bold enough in the way they’re adopting and trying to embrace these new technologies.”

Finally, Atkinson offered a vital reality check on the massive data centres investment announcements in recent months, highlighting the many practical barriers to turning billions of pounds of capital into functioning deployments. From obtaining planning permission to the crucial challenge of securing cost-effective and sustainable energy, the future of these projects is far from certain.

“I think it’ll be interesting to see, of all the hyperscale projects that we’ve seen announced, which actually get shovels in the ground,” said Atkinson. “Many of these projects are dependent on new innovations in cooling system and energy reuse, which are the other half of the equation. If we don’t get those bits right and deal with the carbon problems associate with these power-hungry data centres, we could see these projects stall.”

Watch our full interview below:

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Two of the largest backers of the UK’s alternative broadband networks, NatWest and Lloyds, have now scaled back new lending to the heavily indebted sector. The move follows an earlier report in August 2025 (here), which revealed that a number of banks had set aside funding to cover loans issued to altnets (now deemed unlikely to be repaid in full).

Over the past few years’ we’ve regularly reported on the growing challenges being faced by network builders. Most of that has been fuelled by rising build costs, fierce competition from rivals (e.g. overbuild and the challenges of growing take-up) and the difficulties of securing fresh investment during a period of stubbornly high interest rates (e.g. tackling rising debt repayments).

Many altnets responded to this by switching their strategy from rapid network expansion to focus on commercialisation of what they’ve already built (i.e. growing take-up), which is a sensible approach. But this could also be seen as buying time for natural market consolidation to ramp-up, although it’s so far been moving more slowly than hoped; likely tempered by some unrealistic asset valuations of built infrastructure.

According to the FT (paywall), NatWest and Lloyds have now taken another step by scaling back new lending to the sector. The move, which doesn’t impact existing loans, means that any altnets seeking fresh loans from these banks will need to meet a much higher bar. In the case of Lloyds, they have not implemented a formal or informal policy to halt lending, but are judging prospective clients much more closely on their respective merits.

A spokesperson for Lloyds said:

“Lloyds continually looks for opportunities to help businesses across the UK, in all different sectors and sizes, giving them the funding and support they need to grow.”

A spokesperson for NatWest said:

“We take a considered approach to any lending — whether new or existing customers — and evaluate all decisions on a case-by-case basis.”

None of this will come as a surprise to regular readers of this site and indeed other investors have been taking a more cautious approach for the past couple of years, albeit with some deals still being done. For example, Netomnia completed a £300m junior debt raise in September 2025 (here) and Grain (Grain Connect) confirmed a £225m funding boost – mostly debt and some equity – in July 2025 (here). Not to mention the recent funding deals for GoFibre (here), Wessex Internet (here) and Highland Broadband (here).

As for those in a more difficult position, possible solutions other than consolidation (or complementary to that) are likely to involve a combination of things, such as reaching agreements with other shareholders to inject extra cash, swapping debt for equity or extending credit facilities etc. However, it’s important to reflect that, despite the challenges, all of this investment has helped to produce a much wider variety of competition and thus network choice and coverage for consumers.