Vodafone UK Surge to 1.55 Million Broadband Users as Mobile Falls to 18.3M
Mobile operator and ISP Vodafone UK has today published their Q3 FY25 financial results, which confirms that their fixed line broadband base grew by a new record to total 1.549 million customers (up by 72k in Q3 vs 50k in Q2). But their mobile base fell again to total 18.3m (down by -174k vs -93k in Q2), due entirely to a fall in their prepaid/PAYG base. In terms of their UK fixed broadband services, the operator reported a huge surge in growth, with a quarterly addition of 72,000 customers...
Broadband ISP Grain to Rollout its UK Full Fibre Network into Bury
Alternative network operator Grain (Grain Connect) has confirmed that they’re planning to expand their gigabit speed Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) based broadband ISP network into the Greater Manchester (England) town of Bury. The UK network currently covers over 220,000 premises and connects 30,000 customers. The local rollout in the town, which vaguely aims to reach “thousands of homes”, is getting underway early this very month. After that, the “first customers” are then due to be connected...
From the bully pulpit: FCC’s Carr could strongarm allies over new subsea cable regulation
Feature Week For a man never shy of speaking his mind, returning US President Donald Trump has been remarkably quiet on the topic of submarine cables, an area of increasing geopolitical tension. His new Federal Communications Commission (FCC) chairman, Brendan Carr, on the other hand, will likely have plenty to say as he leads a regulatory shift more than 20 years in the making. Consolidating regulatory power The end of 2024 saw the FCC propose the first changes to their submarine cable...
Ofcom Grant UK Licence for Amazon’s Project Kuiper Broadband Satellites
Ofcom has today grant Amazon’s Project Kuiper a UK Earth Station Network Licence (ESNL), which will support their effort to launch a global mega-constellation of satellites in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) to deliver affordable ultrafast broadband and mobile (4G, 5G) services. The UK telecoms regulator also made more spectrum available in the 28GHz and 32GHz bands. Currently, Amazon are still in the progress of developing their service, which means that they’re trailing well behind established rivals...
Government Invests £16m to Help Develop LEO Broadband Satellite Tech
The government has today released a further £16m of public funding from the UK Space Agency’s £160m Connectivity in Low Earth Orbit (C-LEO) programme, which will be used to develop new satellite technologies that can enhance global connectivity by providing “high-speed internet access” (broadband) to remote and underserved areas etc. The funding is to be split between two innovative projects, starting with Oxfordshire’s EnSilica plc, which will receive £10 million to develop novel silicon...
New West of England Digital Office Looks to Boost Broadband Investment
The West of England Combined Authority, which is led by Mayor Dan Norris and represents the local authorities of Bristol, South Gloucestershire, and Bath and North East Somerset (BNES), has today invested £2.5m to deliver a “Digital Office” that it hopes will “unlock” a £1.3bn annual boost to the region’s economy “powered by private investment in better broadband and mobile connectivity“. What exactly is a Digital Office, you ask? Well, it’s described as being a “groundbreaking initiative” and...
Labour to slash rural broadband funding
News The funding cut could see thousands of rural communities miss out on connectivity coverage upgrades The UK government is set to significantly cut funding to the Shared Rural Network (SRN) project, a scheme designed to improve mobile coverage in remote areas of the country, according to a report from The Telegraph. The SRN aims to deploy shared 4G infrastructure to some of the UK’s most underserved rural areas. The £1 billion scheme is a partnership between the UK’s four mobile...
Westminster City Council Trials Free Connected London WiFi Service
The Westminster City Council (WCC), supported by the Mayor of London (Sadiq Khan), has worked with wireless technology provider Guglielmo and the Wireless Broadband Alliance (WBA) to launch a free public WiFi network trial with a single sign-on (OpenRoaming) technology. This will be available to anyone living, visiting or working in the city. At present, it’s already possible to access a free WiFi network across many parts of Westminster, but most of those require people to sign up and log in...
Roughly 4 to 5 Starlink LEO Broadband Satellites Now Burning Up Per Day
Data released by an independent researcher has revealed that SpaceX appears to now be “retiring and incinerating” about 4 or 5 Starlink broadband satellites from Low Earth Orbit (LEO) every day, which is up sharply from before May 2024, when the average was closer to just one per day. But the exact reason for this seeming mass retirement surge remains unclear. At present Starlink’s network has almost 7,000 satellites in orbit (c.2,800 are v2 Mini / GEN 2A) – mostly at altitudes of c.500-600km...
Broadband ISP Grain Pledges UK Package Price Freeze Until 2027
Alternative network operator Grain (Grain Connect), which has built their own Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) based broadband network to cover over 220,000 UK premises and 30,000 customers, have maintained their promise of no mid-contract price hikes and also pledged to retain their current price freeze until 2027 (if you sign up before 21st Feb 2025). “Broadband prices jumped by up to 8.8% in 2024. And no, that’s not a typo. Across the UK, millions of households were hit with in-contract price...