VEON and Starlink to launch Direct-to-Cell Satellite connectivity in Ukraine
News The connectivity could prove vital in areas where infrastructure is destroyed by Russian military activity Telecoms group VEON has announced a new partnership with Starlink, a division of SpaceX, to bring direct-to-cell satellite connectivity to Ukraine. The deal will see Kyivstar, VEON’s Ukrainian subsidiary, offer these satellite-based connectivity services to its customers across the country. The deal will see Ukraine become one of the first countries to benefit from Starlink’s...
Swisscom completes acquisition of Vodafone Italia
News The news follows final regulatory approval last month Swiss telco Swisscom has completed its acquisition of Vodafone Italia in a move set to reshape the competitive landscape of Italy’s telecoms sector. The deal, valued at €8 billion, was finalised on December 31 following approval from Italian regulators earlier in the month. The acquisition will see Vodafone Italia merged with Swisscom’s existing Italian subsidiary, Fastweb. The move will reduce the number of mobile players in the...
BT Win Four More UK Project Gigabit Broadband Rollout Contracts Worth £289m
The UK government has today confirmed the expected news that BT Group (Openreach) have been formally awarded several new Type C (Cross-Regional) Project Gigabit broadband roll-out contracts. This will help upgrade internet connectivity across more parts (hard to reach rural areas) of Shropshire, Herefordshire, Wales, Devon, Somerset, Essex and North East England, and Worcestershire. Project Gigabit itself has been running for the past few years and aims to extend networks capable of delivering...
UK ISP Glide Completes Debt Refinancing and Agrees New Capex Facility
Business, student and residential ISP Glide Group, which has been busy expanding their full fibre broadband network across more of the UK (leased lines and FTTP etc.), recently announced the successful completion of a refinancing of its existing debt arrangements. The deal also included a new capex (capital expenditure) facility to support growth. The 5-year bank financing is said to have been “oversubscribed“, which suggests there was strong demand from the banking sector. Evercore acted as...
2024 H2 – UK Coverage of Gigabit Broadband Nears 86 Percent
ISPreview has today published our biannual UK summary of fixed broadband coverage for H2 2024, which found that “full fibre” (FTTP) ISP networks have grown to reach 73.53% of premises (up from 67.68% in H1) and 85.87% are within reach of “gigabit” speeds (up from 83.39%). Continue on to see details for England, Wales, Scotland and N.Ireland. Just to recap. Virtually all the new gigabit-capable (1000Mbps+ or 1Gbps+) connectivity added during 2024 has come from Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) based...
INCA CEO Talks Future of UK Broadband Altnets and Infrastructure Sharing
The new CEO of the Independent Networks Co-operative Association (INCA), Paddy Paddison, which represents many of the UK’s alternative broadband operators, has today told ISPreview – as part of a new interview – that he’s optimistic about financial institutions supporting altnets again “over the next year” and wants to see more sharing (infrastructure, wholesale etc.) in the sector. The past year or two have been more than a little bumpy for the markets many altnets. On the one hand, they’ve...
CityFibre Suffers FTTP Broadband Network Outage in York UPDATE
More than four thousand customers on CityFibre’s full fibre broadband network in the Northeast England city of York (Yorkshire and the Humber), which is used by lots of different ISPs (Vodafone, Zen Internet, iDNET, TalkTalk etc.), are this afternoon being affected by a major network outage. The incident, which appears to have started at around 11am this morning, resulted in customers losing internet connectivity and appears as if it could be related to the failure of a core router. But at...
2025 New Year Honours for Ofcom Director’s Services to Telecoms
The UK Government has published their annual New Year Honours List for 2025, which saw Ofcom’s Interim Group Director of Networks and Communications, David Peter Clarkson, being named a “Member of the Order of the British Empire” for his services to telecommunications. The King’s New Year Honours list is said to recognise the achievements and public service of people across the UK, from all walks of life. Anyone can nominate someone for an honour, and nominees are then “checked by various...
Starlink’s Satellite Broadband Hits Capacity Limit in South East England
Customers in the South East of England who may be looking to sign-up with SpaceX’s popular Starlink service, which offers ultrafast broadband connectivity via a global mega constellation of satellites in Low Earth Orbit (LEO), may have to wait a bit longer as the network in that area is now “at capacity“. At present Starlink’s network has a staggering 6,906 satellites (c.2,800 are v2 Mini / GEN 2A) in orbit – mostly at altitudes of c.500-600km – and they’re in the process of adding thousands...
Broadband ISP Plusnet UK Discontinues Static IP Address Option
Low-cost broadband ISP Plusnet (BT Group), which over the past few years has already lost many of its extra features (pay TV, home phone (on FTTP), mobile etc.), appears to have added yet another service to the digital dustbin after customers began complaining that they could no longer add a Static IP address to their accounts. Concern about future support for the Static IP feature, which costs an extra £5 per month to add, first emerged over the summer after some customers reported to...