Three years is a long time for these issues of regional inequalities to sit unaddressed.
Post-COVID, the issue has become even more critical. Research from the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) found that COVID-19 has intensified many of the disparities between regions that the Levelling Up plan seeks to address.
As the nation moves to life post-lockdown, the shift towards hybrid working has already started to unlock the potential of digital transformation when it comes to levelling up the UK. Our own research last year with the Cebr revealed that a continued shift to regional movements due to remote working could result in a talent and skills boost for local economies.
In short, digital tech has a huge role to play in levelling up the UK…
Digital Infrastructure List Next 9 UK Areas for FTTP Broadband Build
Network builder Digital Infrastructure (DI), which last year began deploying a new gigabit-capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband ISP network to cover 1 million premises in 80 UK towns and cities by 2027 (here and here), has today named the next 9 locations to benefit from their rollout. The provider’s first deployment began for 38,000 homes in […]
EE Deploys 200 Small Cells to Boost Urban UK 4G and 5G Cover
Mobile operator EE (BT) has today announced that they’ve deployed 200 units of a new type of small cell (tiny base stations) on UK street furniture and buildings in order to boost the coverage and speed of their 4G based (mobile broadband) network, which they claim allows “customers to benefit from download speeds up to […]
New Rules and Taller Masts to Boost 5G Mobile in Rural England
The Government has today confirmed their intention to introduce a series of changes to Permitted Development (PD) rights for mobile infrastructure, which aims to help extend 5G and 4G (mobile broadband) coverage in rural areas of England via key changes (e.g. allowing taller masts of up to 30 metres). At present all of the major […]
Angus, Perth and Kinross Benefit from New Full Fibre Network
Some 154 rural public sector sites, as well as 650 homes and businesses, across the Angus, Perth & Kinross areas of Scotland are able to benefit from gigabit-capable broadband speeds after BT (Openreach) “completed” infrastructure work on a new “full fibre” network, which was partly funded by the UK Government. The project is being funded […]
Don’t Bank Your ISP Choice on Future FTTP Broadband Build Plans
The rapid rollout of gigabit-capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) based broadband ISP networks across the UK – occurring via a mass of different networks (Summary) – is wonderful to see, but we would caution consumers not to bank their future choice of provider until AFTER such networks have been deployed and gone live. At present over 65% […]
Recent UK Storms Damaged 650 of Openreach’s Telegraph Poles
Last month was unusual for a number of reasons, not least of which was the fact that – in the space of just six days (16th to 21st of February) – the UK experienced three named storms (Dudley, Eunice and Franklin). As a result, over 650 of Openreach’s broadband and phone carrying poles were “badly […]
Commit to wiring every single American – or fall further behind
David McCourt, Chairman of National Broadband Ireland gave a stark warning to the US, “If the U.S. doesn’t provide universal access, it will ensure that the Americans who are already struggling to compete in the global economy will fall further behind"…
Champagne time? Rogers acquisition of Shaw loses its sparkle
Twelve months ago Canada’s Rogers Communications agreed to buy Shaw Communications in a transaction valued at CAD 26 billion, proclaiming the combination of the two networks would create the possibility of “unprecedented wireline and wireless broadband and network investments…
ISP Gigaclear Freezes Prices for 18 Months – Ahead of 2023 Hike
UK ISP Gigaclear, which is busy extending their 1Gbps Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband network across rural parts of England, has today announced that they’re “freezing … prices for 18 months at the lowest ever rate” in order to help tackle the ongoing cost of living crisis. But there’s a catch, a big hike is coming in […]