BT offers free fibre to Glasgow businesses

BT is offering a free taste of superfast broadband to businesses in Glasgow.

The trial is part of the telco's ongoing investment in fibre infrastructure in the UK. Back in 2008 BT announced it would be spending £1.5bn to bring fibre broadband to around 10 million homes and businesses by 2012.

BT business customers in the Glasgow Halfway exchange area are being offered the chance to trial fibre to the cabinet (FTTC) broadband, the telco said yesterday. The service offers downloads speeds of up to 40Mbps and upstream speeds of 2Mbps. The fibre service will be free until the end of March 2010.

Fibre broadband comes in two flavours: FTTC, where optical cable is laid as far as the curbside cabinet, with existing copper lines being used for the last mile; and fibre to the home (FTTH), where optical cable is laid the whole way to the premises. While FTTC offers a speed bump over all-copper broadband, even faster speeds can generally be attained via FTTH.

BT's non-business customers in the Glasgow Halfway area will not be given a free taste of fibre but will be able to sign up to the paid-for FTTC service which will launch early next year, BT added.

BT's Glasgow taster follows FTTC trials in Whitchurch in Cardiff, and Muswell Hill in London - where the telco has opened a shop to shout about the benefits of fibre. Last month the telco also pledged to roll out FTTH broadband to 2.5 million homes and businesses - as part of its £1.5bn fibre investment.

Bill Murphy, managing director of BT Business, said the aim of the trials is to get feedback from customers on how they want to use the service and what's possible in real-world conditions.

A survey of SMEs conducted by Vanson Bourne for BT Business found more than half (61 per cent) believe fibre is having a positive impact on their businesses. Almost a third (28 per cent) of the respondents said they are already using faster broadband to expand their website capabilities, while another quarter claim to be using it to drive more processes online.

The survey was based on the responses of more than 7,200 SMEs polled during September 2009.