Vtesse Broadband have announced today that two 'final third' communities in Cornwall can now receive faster broadband thanks to work to deploy high-speed broadband to the area. 574 households in Higher Pill and 262 in Hatt can now get access to broadband at speeds of up to 40meg for £30 a month. Vtesse had conducted technical trials with Virgin Media to 15 households in the area prior to launching the service and customer response was positive.
"Hatt and Higher Pill, like so many places in Cornwall and the South West, have endured painfully slow broadband connections, making even the simplest online task - sending an email attachment, checking the weather forecast or uploading photos to Facebook - a complete chore.
Super-fast broadband makes all this information available at the touch of a button and really has the power to change the way these communities use the internet for work, study and leisure.
One third of UK homes and businesses either have no broadband at all or experience poor connection speeds; a situation which is grossly unfair for those who fall on the wrong side of the digital divide. This gap exists because of the way companies like ourselves are taxed and charged for bringing services to new areas. Until these barriers come down, it will be uneconomical to deliver broadband nationwide."
Aidan Paul, (Chief Executive) Vtesse Broadband
The government recently went back on promises to revise the rating system to make it more economical for smaller providers to deploy fibre. The new revised rules from the VOA actually make it more expensive for smaller providers with some fibre links now costing 10 times what they had previously. This obviously goes against the government plans to try and encourage broadband providers to deliver broadband without using public money.
Vtesse are on a roll helping out areas that have long suffered from slow speeds. They really need to be congratulated. Hopefully the next ISPA awards will notice their work, rather than give the awards out to the usual suspects.