Esprit European network division goes live

Esprit Telecom has launched a networks division devoted to selling bandwidth to rival carriers.

Canadian telco, Teleglobe and a number of Internet service providers including Demon Internet have jumped at the chance to buy their own wavelengths from Esprit's pan-European broadband fibre network.

The companies are already using Esprit's London-Paris link and have pre-purchased bandwidth on the Amsterdam-Rotterdam route - which goes live in January 1999.

Glen Manoss, Esprit Telecom's director of communications, said: "Our main customers are foreign and US-based companies which want to increase their European capacity.

"We have always sold our spare capacity, but growing demand now makes it worthwhile to set up a parallel business as a carrier's carrier."

Esprit Telecom has also quadrupled its bandwidth capacity. The network relies on Nortel's Dense Wave Division Multiplexing to offer speeds of up to 10Gbps.

The full network - which will include a number of Spanish cities - will be completed in the middle of next year.