Thousands of homes across Wales are set to get access to ultrafast broadband for the first time, it has been confirmed.
Openreach has announced that it is investing £30m in a new roll-out which will impact more than 87,000 homes and businesses in many parts of south Wales.
The new full fibre broadband, which the company has described as “ultrafast and ultra reliable”, will be available to most properties in Bridgend, Port Talbot, Neath, Gorseinon, Skewen, Briton Ferry and Seven Sisters.
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According to Openreach, the new set-up provides speeds of 1 Gbps, which is up to ten times faster then the average home broadband connection, which means faster downloads, better quality video and higher resolution when streaming movies and TV on various platforms.
It also means that people can use multiple devices within the same household without speeds being affected, and connections being less impacted by peak-time congestion.
The plans follow the announcement earlier this year that hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses would have access to the new network in other areas, including several rural communities like Abersoch, Bethesda, Borth, Cardigan, Nefyn, Nelson, Narberth, Llantwit Major and Kidwelly.
Lee Waters, the Welsh Government’s deputy minister for climate change, has welcomed the news. He said: “The importance of fast reliable broadband has become even more apparent and we welcome this investment as a key part of the market effort to boost connections across south Wales.”
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Openreach’s regional director for Wales, Connie Dixon, said: Good connectivity is vital – whether it’s to work from home, access education and care services, or for gaming and streaming entertainment – and that’s why we’re investing across the UK to upgrade our network to 25 million premises.
“Nobody’s building faster, further or to a higher standard across Wales and the rest of the UK than Openreach, and we’ve already reached six million homes and businesses with ultrafast full fibre technology, including around 400,000. It’s proving popular as well, with around 23% already choosing to start using it.
“Our engineers and build partners are reaching more communities every week and we’re not just building in cities and urban areas. Many rural and hard to reach communities are already benefitting and we plan to reach many more in the coming months and years.”
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