Microsoft partners with Lumen to revamp data centres as AI demand soars
Press Release Lumen Technologies (NYSE: LUMN) and Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) have announced a partnership that will use the Microsoft Cloud to further drive Lumen’s digital transformation. In addition, Microsoft has chosen Lumen to expand its network capacity and capability to meet the growing demand on its datacenters due to AI. A network for the AI era Datacenters have become critical infrastructure that power the compute capabilities for the millions of people and organizations who rely...
nexfibre passes almost 1.3m homes with full fibre
Press Release nexfibre, the next generation fibre network operator, has today published the latest quarterly update of its nationwide rollout plan The report reveals planned build locations for 2025 and early 2026, with significantly expanded footprint in previously underserved areas of North Wales and Scotland. The update demonstrates nexfibre’s commitment to bringing sustainable, national-scale competition to the fibre access market, with network expansion set to benefit towns across the UK,...
CEO of UK Broadband ISP Zzoomm Prep FTTP Growth via Consolidation
The CEO of Oxfordshire-based alternative broadband provider Zzoomm, Matthew Hare, has revealed that they’re still aspiring to cover 1 million UK premises with their 2Gbps FTTP network (despite the recent move to stop new building work), but “if we can’t build it ourselves then … you have to buy it” (growing through consolidation). Just to recap. Zzoomm has so far extended their Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) network to cover 202,000 premises (RFS) – with 30,000 customers expected in August 2024...
Nexfibre Publish Q2 2024 UK Full Fibre Broadband Rollout Update
Network operator nexfibre, which shares some of their parentage with retail ISP partner Virgin Media (VMO2), has this morning published their latest quarterly (Q2 2024) progress update on the roll-out of their new 10Gbps capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP / XGS-PON) broadband ISP network. This includes details on build locations for 2025 and early 2026. We’ll start with the usual recap. Back in 2022 Telefónica, Liberty Global and InfraVia Capital Partners setup nexfibre as a new £4.5bn joint...
Sky UK Reveals Broadband Traffic, TV and Mobile Network Usage Stats
Comcast-owned internet, TV and mobile provider Sky UK has published an interesting new report, which reveals a lot of interesting details about their network and TV usage, which we haven’t previously seen. For example, Sky Broadband now has 1.5 million FTTP customers and internet traffic peaked at 24.35Tbps on 9th April 2024. The new ‘Sky Attention Index‘ (PDF) report, which includes data from the January to June 2024 period, broadly summarises a sizeable amount of data from across Sky’s...
Virgin Media O2 See UK Broadband Users Fall to 5.71 Million as Nexfibre Ramps FTTP
The latest Q2 2024 results from Virgin Media (O2) have today been published, which reveals that they’re now home to 5,710,700 fixed broadband customers (down by -12.2k in Q2 2024 vs +5.3k in Q1) and built another 295,300 full fibre (FTTP) premises – mostly via nexfibre (up from 194k last quarter). Both VM and nexfibre now cover 5m premises via full fibre. According to the latest results, the combined VMO2 and nexfibre broadband network currently reaches 17,489,000 Homes Serviceable (up from...
Which? Name ISP Virgin Media as Worst UK Telecoms Provider for 2024
Consumer magazine Which? have today named the winners of their annual Shoddy Awards 2024, which lists the companies that have done poorly through the year. Suffice to say that broadband provider Virgin Media picked up the award for “Worst Telecoms Company” for the second year running, due to “poor customer service and mid-contract price hikes“. In order to be nominated for a “Shoddy“, companies had to fall short on one of the following criteria: failing an industry standard, potentially...
Telstra joins UNESCO’s Business Council to promote ethical AI
Press Release Telstra has joined a select group of global organisations to champion and advance the ethical development and application of AI Telstra is the first Australian organisation, and the sixth globally, to join the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)’s Business Council to promote the implementation of its Recommendation on the Ethics of Artificial Intelligence. The UNESCO Recommendation on the Ethics of Artificial Intelligence advocates for AI...
Lift-off for AALTO’s Zephyr inches closer with DOA certification
News The approval puts the solar-powered High Altitude Platform Station (HAPS) one step closer to commercial launch, currently targeted for 2026 Today, US-based HAPS specialist AALTO has announced that it has received Design Organisation Approval (DOA) from the UK Civil Aviation Authority for its solar-powered HAPS, Zephyr. The approval confirms that “AALTO is an organisation with capabilities to design aircraft to the highest standards”. The announcement notably makes AALTO the first HAPS...
CityFibre Make UK Broadband Engineers Available on Saturdays
Good news. Customers taking a residential or business broadband package from an ISP on CityFibre’s growing national Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) network will now also be able to benefit from Saturday appointments for service repairs too, which will be handled just like the usual Monday to Friday (workday) slots. A CityFibre spokesperson told ISPreview this morning: “Our engineers are now available for appointments on a Saturday, meaning customers have greater choice and flexibility about when...