Internet connection benchmarking firm nPerf has today published the results from a new crowdsourced study into fixed broadband ISP speeds across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. But oddly the results only cover Sky Broadband, Virgin Media, Vodafone, TalkTalk, Fibrus (NI) and Ogi (Wales).

The latest nPerf study is based on speedtests that were carried out – between 1st January and 31st December 2024 – exclusively by end-customers using tools on both nPerf’s website and via their dedicated mobile testing apps for Android and iOS. But we don’t get any hard stats on the sample sizes or structure.

However, in a somewhat unusual outcome, the UK’s largest broadband provider – BT (inc. EE and Plusnet) – is nowhere to be found in any of the summaries. The company added that they “only include national internet service providers with a test share above 5%“, which suggests that BT somehow ended up, in every nation, with a very small sample of results and that seems questionable.

Suffice to say that we recommend taking these results, which we’ve summarised below, with a pinch of salt. But you can also read the individual reports here for more detail.

Broadband ISP Plusnet has introduced a bunch of new discounts across their home broadband plans for new customers, which for example has cut the monthly price of their top 900Mbps Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) package to just £37.99 per month on a 24-month term (price increases by £3 per month from April each year). Plus there’s a £110 reward card thrown-in.

The internet provider’s fibre broadband packages are typically data-only plans (no home phone) that include unlimited usage, a new Hub Two wireless router (re-branded BT Smart Hub 2), UK based support, a 24-month minimum contract term, Plusnet SafeGuard and Protect – both powered by Norton – and free activation.

Take note that, on 31st March each year, the monthly plan price will increase by £3 for broadband and out of bundle charges will increase 5%. We’ve summarised what this means and the latest deals below.

Plusnet’s February 2025 Broadband Discounts

Full Fibre 145Mbps (30Mbps upload)
£50 Reward Card (pre-paid Mastercard)
Price: £26.99 per month

Price increases to £29.99pm on 1st April 2025 and £32.99pm on 1st April 2026

Full Fibre 300Mbps (50Mbps)
Price: £28.99

Price increases to £31.99pm on 1st April 2025 and £34.99pm on 1st April 2026

Full Fibre 500Mbps (75Mbps)
£110 Reward Card (pre-paid Mastercard)
Price: £32.99

Price increases to £35.99pm on 1st April 2025 and £38.99pm on 1st April 2026

Full Fibre 900Mbps (115Mbps)
£110 Reward Card (pre-paid Mastercard)
Price: £37.99

Price increases to £40.99pm on 1st April 2025 and £43.99pm on 1st April 2026

Take note that Plusnet also sell a 75Mbps FTTP and SOGEA (FTTC) based broadband tier that starts at £25.99 per month, which also comes with a £110 Reward Card.

Broadband ISP and telecoms giant BT have today confirmed that they will recruit more than 600 additional apprentices and graduates in 2025 (up from 500 in 2024) – forming part of their September 2025 intake. The roles will span across areas such as cybersecurity, software engineering and customer service.

As usual, the new roles will be also be spread across a number of UK locations, including in Belfast, Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Darlington, Ipswich, Leeds, London, Manchester, Sheffield, and Warrington (field-based roles will also be in communities across the country).

BT notes that they’re one of the UK’s largest private sector apprenticeship employers and have recruited more than 3,000 apprentices and graduates over the past five years, although this does tend to gloss over job losses in other areas.

Athalie Williams, Chief Human Resources Officer at BT Group, said:

“I’m incredibly proud of the opportunities we provide to develop new talent at BT Group and recognise the valuable contributions graduates and apprentices bring to the workforce. Last year alone, we recruited around 500 apprentices and graduates, all eager to learn, develop their skills, and help deliver better experiences for our customers.”

Further details can be found here – https://www.bt.com/earlycareers.

Broadband ISP Virgin Media (inc. nexfibre and O2) and civil engineering partner Svella Connect are currently trying to resolve a difficult dispute over “contractual terms“, which touches on issues of worker safety, rate reductions, and work volumes for Nexfibre. But there’s still hope for an amicable solution that may avoid the risk of redundancies.

For context. Svella Connect is a telecommunications contractor working with Virgin Media, Openreach and CityFibre to help expand their respective national fibre optic broadband networks. A good chunk of their work with Virgin Media was acquired when they gobbled up the struggling telecoms division of NMCN Plc at the start of 2022 (here).

Svella Connect was thus previously carrying out work for Virgin Media under both their past Project Lightning network expansion and the more recent Morpheus contracts, with the Morpheus framework originally running until March 2025.

However, recently ISPreview has observed a rise in complaints from certain Virgin Media areas, which were previously known to be covered by engineers from Svella Connect but which now seemed to be handled by another contractor. The complaints tended to manifest as delays for customers getting connected and awaiting re-pulls etc.

Admittedly cable re-pulls, which usually reflect a change of cable to your home, can sometimes involve multiple engineers to complete, or construction work and permissions from local councils that can cause delays. But on digging deeper (no pun intended) we also discovered that Svella Connect had begun the process of lodging a Part 7 Claim against Virgin Media.

Svella Connected commented:

“Last year, Svella and Virgin Media mutually agreed to transfer the Morpheus contract to O’Connor Utilities, with the understanding that this would secure longer-term volumes under the Lightning contract. Any customer service concerns that have arisen are likely post-transfer, as Svella Connect is not aware of any outstanding issues from its period of work.

Separately, Svella Connect has raised concerns regarding Virgin Media’s approach to contractual terms. This includes attempted unilateral rate reductions and a shift to less safe working practices—particularly the move away from MEWPs for overhead work to ladders, which was not part of the original agreement.

Svella Connect also believes that Virgin Media has not fulfilled certain obligations under the transfer agreement, particularly in relation to work volumes for Nexfibre. As a result, Svella has lodged a claim for financial impacts arising from these breaches. However, this has not been formally issued, as discussions are ongoing in the hope of resolving matters amicably and endeavouring to mitigate the impact of any potential job losses that failure to provide these volumes will cause.”

The contractor also clarified that there were “no genuine performance concerns” on Svella’s part, and that payments continue to be made by Virgin Media for all amounts outside of the claim.

A Virgin Media spokesperson told ISPreview:

“We are continuing to work with Svella and providing open and constructive feedback, as we do with all our valued build partners, to ensure they meet the high standards we expect.”

Disputes between network operators and contractors do happen in this industry, although they often get resolved before reaching the courts and thus simply go unnoticed by the wider public. Hopefully an amicable solution can be found for both sides here too, which would help to avoid the aforementioned risk of future redundancies. Equally, it’s easy to understand how some existing customer work might still be impacted by a change in contractor.

The Government’s Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) has published contract modification notices for CityFibre’s state aid funded Project Gigabit broadband roll-outs across four regions – Hampshire (Lot 27), Suffolk (Lot 2), Cambridgeshire (Lot 5) and Norfolk (Lot 7). The changes increase the level of committed public funding and often also the contracted scope.

Just to recap. The original announcement in July 2024 (here) pledged £114m for Norfolk to help CityFibre expand their full fibre (FTTP) network to reach an additional 62,200 homes and businesses in hard-to-reach rural areas, while Suffolk saw a commitment of £100m to reach 79,500 premises and Hampshire got £104m for 75,500 premises (this excludes the impact from CityFibre’s complementary commercial builds).

Separately, during March 2023, the operator also secured £69m to reach a further 45,000 premises in Cambridgeshire and adjacent areas under the same project (here). Since then, CityFibre has begun construction work on all of these projects, as well as several other Project Gigabit contracts.

However, today we’re only focused on the above four contracts, where the government has just published formal contract modification notices, which increases the level of committed public funding for each.

CityFibre’s BDUK Contract Modifications

Hampshire (Lot 27)

Original figure: £104m

Awarded value after modification £127,875,417, increase in value of £23,700,419.

Suffolk (Lot 2)

Original figure: £100m

Awarded value after modification £116,015,193, increase in value of £15,615,917

Cambridgeshire (Lot 5)

Original figure: £69m

Awarded value after modification £73,466,901 increase in value of £4,830,110.

Norfolk (Lot 7)

Original figure: £114m

Awarded value after modification £128,804,454, increase in value of £14,587,891.

The reality is that such contracts are not static and their scope, as well as committed levels of public funding, can change over time for a number of different reasons (as instructed by regular ‘Public Reviews’ of UK deployment plans). For example, commercial operators may expand or reduce their deployment plans in the same region, which can reduce or grow the scope for public investment within a contracted area.

The contracted operator could also find the deployment more expensive or even cheaper than previously envisaged, such as due to changes in build costs and interest rates / inflation, as well as any unexpected obstacles to street works or greater efficiencies of build than planned or expected.

In other cases, such as in Norfolk, we already know that a big chunk of the recent funding increase was because, at the time of the original award, several thousand additional premises were still being reviewed for future inclusion into the contract (here). But officially the latest contract modifications only list the following reasons, without giving any specifics.

Reasons for modification

Need for additional works, services or supplies by the original contractor/concessionaire.

Description of the economic or technical reasons and the inconvenience or duplication of cost preventing a change of contractor:

Additional scope added to the contract in accordance with the UK subsidy control regime

The new notices make no mention of the numerical impact upon premises passed, although the latest documentation from the Government’s executive Building Digital UK (BDUK) agency now lists each contract as having the following coverage targets: Hampshire (91,035 premises – up from 75.5k), Suffolk (88,970 – up from 79.5k), Cambridgeshire (47,154 – up from 45k) and Norfolk (75,587 – up from 62.2k).

Suffice to say, the deployments may now cost a fair bit more, but they’re also going to reach more premises than originally planned. This could of course also mean that they’ll take a bit longer to reach completion than originally envisaged, as there’s now more work to be done.

On the flip side, BDUK do seem to pump out a lot of different figures – in different places – for the same contracts, which can be confusing and could easily be cleared up if they just centralised how they communicate all these changes and updates. We should add that BDUK are aware of this problem and have been looking to tidy things up in the near future.

News

Tele2’s executive changes continue with the exit of the company’s current CCO and CFO

This week, Swedish operator Tele2 has announced the latest in a string of managerial changes, with both the company’s Chief Commercial Officer (CCO) and Chief Financial Officer (CFO) departing imminently.

The announcement has seen current CCO Hendrik de Groot leave the company to be replaced by Petr Cermak, who has most recently served as Telia’s Group Chief Commercial and Strategy Officer.

Cermak will take over the role on 10 February.

“I am very pleased to welcome Petr to the team. His extensive telecom expertise, strategic mindset, and ability to drive change will be invaluable as we accelerate the transformation of Tele2 into a faster and stronger company,” said Jean Marc Harion, CEO & President at Tele2.

In the same announcement, Tele2 also announced that CFO Charlotte Hansson is departing, with Peter Landgren, currently Head of Financial Reporting & Operations at Tele2, taking over the role immediately on an interim basis, effective immediately.

The company says a permanent replacement is currently being recruited and will be appointed ‘in the coming months’.

“I thank Hendrik and Charlotte for their steadfast dedication and leadership during their time with Tele2. They have both been instrumental for Tele2’s commercial and financial progress in the past four years, and I wish them all the best in their future endeavors,” added Harion.

This is the latest in a string of management changes for Tele2, much of which appears related to the 20% stake in the business purchased by Iliad Group in February last year. Iliad’s CEO Thomas Raynaud being made Tele2 chairman in April and by September Tele2’s CEO Kjell Johnsen had announced his exit, to be replaced by Harion – then head of Iliad Poland – in November.

Shortly after this, Tele2’s CTIO Yogesh Malik also left the company, while executive VP of people and change, Jenny Garneij, and the company’s chief operations officer (COO), Kim Hagberg, both announced their exits in January.

This shakeup and drive for a new operational direction was also evident in the company’s most recent financial results, which were released at the end of last month.

Commenting on the results, Harion warned the company would undergo ‘significant changes’ during 2025.

“We will reduce complexity, reinforce cost discipline and carefully select investments to focus on those that make a real difference for our customers. Our organisation will undergo significant changes during 2025. This will be a challenging time for all our colleagues, especially those directly affected by the reorganisation. Myself and all Tele2 leaders carry a great responsibility in the coming months to ensure that this process is as transparent, respectful and supportive as possible. These changes are however necessary to make Tele2 a faster and more agile company, better equipped to swiftly capture market opportunities,” he said.

In the same announcement, the company said it would reduce it total workforce by 15%, amounting to around 700 jobs.

Keep up to date with the latest international telecoms news by subscribing to the Total Telecom newsletter

Also in the news:
Vodafone reports strong Q3 growth amid Germany challenges
CEO of AireBeam discusses ‘secret sauce’ behind ISP’s growth
BT scraps managerial DEI targets

News 

SK Telecom has joined the “MIT GenAI Impact Consortium” as a founding member to explore the real-world applications and business impact of generative AI 

MIT has been actively studying generative AI-driven industrial transformation, with researchers publishing 25 papers on generative AI in the past year. Now, the university is forming a GenAI Impact Consortium aimed at better understanding how this new technology will shape the future of industries and society. 

The founding members of the consortium include six global companies from various industries SK Telecom, OpenAI, The Coca-Cola Company, Indian conglomerate Tata Group, Analog Devices, and wealth management company TWG Global. 

The project is supported by MIT President Sally Kornbluth and led by Anantha Chandrakasan, Dean of the MIT School of Engineering and Chief Innovation and Strategy Officer.  

The consortium will select key projects and oversee research efforts, which have not yet been stated. 

“The MIT GenAI Impact Consortium is the ideal bridge between academia and industry,” said Chandrakasan. “While Generative AI and LLMs are reshaping everything, the consortium aims to break down barriers, bring together disciplines, and commit to ensuring the benefits of Generative AI are realised throughout the world,” said Anantha Chandrakasan, Dean of the MIT School of Engineering and MIT’s Chief Innovation and Strategy Officer in a press release. 

For SK Telecom, the consortium will allow the company share AI expertise from a telco perspective, as well as exploring new collaboration opportunities and apply MIT’s research insights to its existing AI R&D Centre.  

 In December last year, the company announced a company restructuring to focus on two areas: AI and telecommunications. As part of this,  AI R&D areas were merged to strengthen AI and digital transformation (AT/DT) capabilities. The centre leads SK Group’s AI strategy, focusing on areas such as ICT, semiconductors, energy, and AI-driven technologies such as digital twins and AI-powered factories. 

Research projects will officially begin this year. 

“As a founding member of the MIT Consortium, we are excited to collaborate with MIT’s world-class faculty,” said Ryu Young-sang, CEO of SK Telecom. 

“Building on global collaborations, SK Telecom hope to leverage the AI capabilities of the SK Group, with the SK AI R&D Centre at its core, to drive AI innovation across industries. Beyond generative AI, we will broaden our scope to encompass next-generation research areas and to convergent Vertical AI such as physical AI, manufacturing, and biotechnology,” he continued. 

SKT are making an effort to become a world leading telco in AI. Last June, SKT, along with Deutsche Telekom, e&, Singtel and SoftBank signed a joint venture for telco AI development, making them the founding partners of the Global Telco AI Alliance.  

The five companies have agreed to develop Large Language Models (LLMs) that are specifically designed to meet telco needs, in areas such as improving customer interactions via digital assistants and chatbots. The LLMs will be tailored to the needs of the five companies in their respective markets. 

Keep up to date with the latest international telecoms news by subscribing to the Total Telecom newsletter 

Also in the news:
Vodafone reports strong Q3 growth amid Germany challenges
CEO of AireBeam discusses ‘secret sauce’ behind ISP’s growth
BT scraps managerial DEI targets

Podcasts

Ben Elkins, the CEO of AireBeam and Utah Broadband, joined the ‘Beyond the Cable’ podcast to discuss strategy and AireBeam’s explosive growth in Arizona

By: Brad Randall, Broadband Communities

Since taking the helm as the CEO of an Arizona City-based AireBeam, Ben Elkins has overseen a 375 percent growth in fiber subscribers for the ISP.

Now, Elkins is attempting to repeat success at another subsidiary of the Boston Omaha Corporation: Utah Broadband.

Named as the Utah Broadband’s CEO in May, Elkins now wears both hats, one as the CEO of AireBeam, another as the CEO of Utah Broadband. He reflected on some of AireBeam’s growth, and how he was able to achieve such stunning success in Arizona’s Pinal County.

“It’s very rural, but it’s growing,” Elkins said of Pinal County. “It’s the fastest growing county in the state of Arizona.”

Wedged between Phoenix and Tuscon, Elkins said it came to his attention after research that many of the county’s mobile home parks were severely underserved.

“So, I went out and got nationwide deals with a lot of the mobile home park developers,” he said. “And provided fiber to the parks that really fit or demographics and fit our profile.”

Elkins said he was able to lock in 20-year agreements with some developers.

According to Elkins, many mobile home parks are ignored by larger service providers because residents are often temporary.

“It’s been a huge hit for us,” he said, adding that AireBeam also “fibered up” the entire community of Arizona City and Florence.

While Elkins said the explosive-type growth that AireBeam saw was likely unique due to demographics in the area, he also predicts growth ahead for Utah Broadband.

Listen to Elkins on Spotify

Click here to listen to the full interview with Elkins on Spotify, and why he believes Utah still contains “huge opportunity” for Utah Broadband.

Listen to Elkins on Apple Podcasts

To hear the episode featuring Elkins on Apple Podcasts, click here.

Learn more about Broadband Communities Summit 2025 in Houston.

Also, click here to subscribe to the Broadband Communities newsletter. 

And now for something completely different. Rural broadband ISP Quickline, which is rolling out a gigabit-capable full fibre (FTTP) and 5G powered fixed wireless access (FWA) network across rural parts of England (Yorkshire and Lincolnshire), has helped to launch a new children’s book that explains the work network operators do and educates on safety etc.

The book – ‘Cones and Rural Broadband‘, which was commissioned by Quickline and written by author Chris Madeley, is the latest in a series involving animated traffic cones that “come to life to explore the world around them“. The book introduces young readers to the world of broadband while reinforcing important health and safety messages.

The first copies were handed out, for free, at a special event at the University of Bradford, where Lord Mayor of Bradford, Councillor Beverley Mullaney, joined around 100 pupils and teachers from eight West Yorkshire schools to celebrate the launch.

Sean Royce, CEO at Quickline, said:

“We’re delighted to support primary schools across Yorkshire with this donation. The books are a fun and engaging way for young people to learn about broadband and safety, while also sparking an interest in the telecommunications industry.

At Quickline, we believe in leaving a lasting legacy in the communities we serve. By mixing the best of both worlds – reading books and using digital tools – we can help our young people to learn, create and imagine the future. I’d like to thank everyone involved in this fantastic project for helping us get these books into the hands of local children.”

Chris Madeley, Author, added:

“The real purpose behind the Cones book series is to show children opportunities available to them when they grow up, teach them about different industries and careers and to get them engaged. I thoroughly enjoyed working with Quickline on this book explaining the importance of rural connectivity and it’s been really interesting finding out for myself about the technology and explaining it in a way that children will understand.”

Sadly, we weren’t provided a copy of the book, although we did get a nice picture of some semi-enthusiastic looking children enjoying a read. Perhaps they got to a cartoon section where the talking traffic cones were tasked with filling out Openreach’s PIA forms – lasting a full 10 pages, before ultimately walking into the path of an oncoming truck out of despair (disclaimer – no such pages actually appear in the book, we’re joking, hopefully).

On a more serious note, we’ve not seen anything quite like this being done by a broadband operator before, and it does seem like a very interesting and positive approach.

Insight

Access to backbone connectivity varies significantly across the European Union (EU) and, in some regions, inadequate connectivity can impact the development and performance of access networks. This disparity may also lead to potential imbalances in service pricing for both network operators and users. Fortunately, EU funding programme CEF-Digital plays a crucial role in addressing these connectivity challenges by supporting infrastructure development in those regions where market forces fail to address them.

Ensuring robust quality and resilience of the networks within Europe and beyond is of strategic importance to the EU. It is vital for safeguarding its sovereignty in this domain.

Therefore, the European Health and Digital Executive Agency (HaDEA) is pleased to announce its third participation as an exhibitor at the Submarine Networks EMEA event. Hervé Dupuy, Head of Unit responsible for managing CEF-Digital, will present updates on the programme’s latest developments during the “News in Brief” session on Tuesday, 18 February 2025.

To date, the programme has awarded €420 million in grants to 51 projects, the majority of which focus on subsea cables. Currently, the EU is co-funding studies and cable deployment projects in regions such as the Arctic, the North and Baltic Seas, the Caribbean, the Atlantic Ocean, the Mediterranean Sea, as well as cables connecting the Canary Islands, the Azores, and Madeira.

As a key part of the European Union’s renowned Global Gateway Strategy, HaDEA runs CEF-Digital’s Backbone Connectivity for Digital Global Gateways programme that co-funds the deployment of backbone network systems within EU countries, between EU countries, and between the EU and its global partners. This initiative aims to ensure that gigabit connectivity becomes widely accessible and secure for businesses and individuals.

Projects co-funded by Connecting Europe Facility Digital in Backbone Networks.

According to Hervé Dupuy: “With our fourth call for proposals open until 13 February, we have earmarked €128 million to support the construction of infrastructures that meet the Union’s connectivity needs, including complementary routes that enhance redundancy. We are especially prioritising projects that incorporate state-of-the-art technological solutions, such as smart cables. Proposals that combine complementary initiatives to achieve a broader geographical reach and that avoid overlapping segments are also important to us.”

The Submarine Networks EMEA conference has proven to be an invaluable platform for the European Commission to connect with current and future beneficiaries of the CEF-Digital programme within the submarine cable industry.

CEF-Digital is a funding programme initiated by the European Union in 2021 to support and catalyse investments in digital connectivity infrastructures of common European interest, with a total budget of €1.5 billion.

Join HaDEA at Submarine Networks EMEA, the world’s most important subsea connectivity event

Also in the news:
From the bully pulpit: FCC’s Carr could pursuade allies over new subsea cable regulation
Labour to slash rural broadband funding
EE renews partnership with Home Nations Football Associations and Wembley Stadium