Quickline’s fibre network is now live for thousands of residents and businesses in villages across the Isle of Axholme in north Lincolnshire.
Openreach is investing £13.5m to serve around 45,000 more homes and businesses across the Isle of Wight with full fibre.
When work is finished, most people living and working in Ventnor, Ryde, Sandown, Freshwater, Newport, Shanklin, Bembridge, Wootton Bridge and Niton will be able to access fibre services
This adds to the work already done by Openreach in Cowes, where nearly 50% of homes and businesses can upgrade.
Openreach employs 50 people on the Island and five specialist engineers from its Chief Engineer’s team will be supervising the build in addition to further support from engineering partners and a dedicated civil engineering team based at Ryde.
Connie Dixon, Regional Director for the south east, said: “So far we have reached 800,000 across the region, but we know there’s more to do and we’re committed to doing it.”
Research by the Centre for Economics and Business Research (Cebr) found that connecting everyone in the south east to fibre could create a £8.7bn boost to the local economy.
ENDS