Full fibre on its way to 9,000 premises in and around Chipping Norton
Thursday 05 July 2012 13:45:23 by Andrew Ferguson

Residents of Chipping Norton may in the next year be able to boast of having some of the most future proof broadband services in the UK. Cotswolds Broadband is looking to deploy a full fibre (FTTP) service to some 9,000 homes in the Chipping Norton area of West Oxfordshire.

Cotswolds Broadband will be the infrastructure operator, allowing a variety of retail providers to offer their service over the network, with initially packages connecting at 40 Mbps and 100 Mbps. The project has some funding from the Rural Community Broadband Fund which is administered by DEFRA and the BDUK with the purpose of improving broadband in the more rural parts of the UK. The level of funding is thought to be around £1.5m.

"We believe our Community Investment programme will be of interest to those individuals and organisations based in West Oxfordshire who, like me, are frustrated by the lack of investment by telecom providers in rural areas which will negatively impact on our local economy. We collectively have to take control of our own connected future if we are to be competitive and to have our lives enhanced by all the benefits that next generation broadband will bring."

Hugo Pickering, CEO of Cotswolds Broadband,

We look forward to seeing the service roll-out and deliver services to people in the area, and if demand is good there is the possibility of the service expanding to cover more areas in the Cotswolds.