Cheshire IT company strikes deal with BT for ultrafast broadband
A Congleton industrial automation company has joined forces with BT to bring ultrafast broadband to its offices in Astbury.The company is the first business in the North West to sign up to the BT Community Fibre Partnerships scheme.
Openreach,the local network business which is part of BT Group, will install the latest Fibre to the Premises (FTTP) technology capable of delivering ultrafast speeds up to one gigabit per second (Gbps) as part of the BT scheme.
Newfield Automation in Brook Lane, Astbury, provides technology solutions to automate processes and machinery to large global brands such as 3M, Bentley, Siemens and UK airports, including Manchester.
The company’s 20 staff are expected to be able to benefit from the ultrafast speeds by Spring 2018. In addition, two other local businesses and the parish council will benefit from the investment as they have offices within the same premises.
Jonathan Meacham, IT manager at the company, said: “We’re currently stuck with slow speeds due to our rural location and as an industrial automation company this can make things difficult when running our business.
“We need to access a lot of software and currently we have to get that through the post. When our fibre broadband is up and running we will be able to instantly download it online so that will save us so much time and provide a much quicker service to our customers and partners.
“We will also be switching to Voice over IP for our phone calls so that will save us a lot of money being able to make calls using the internet.
“In the future we would like to start using the cloud for online storage and back up, something that we can’t currently do with our slow speeds.”
Newfield Automation’s employees will also be able to work from home better due to the company’s online systems running faster and more efficiently.
The cost of bringing fibre broadband technology to the offices has been covered by the company and Openreach.
Kieran Charleson, BT’s regional director for the North West, said: “We are working with lots of communities in Cheshire and the North West to bring fibre broadband to those hard to reach areas and it’s great that we have been able to work with our first small business in the region to find a partnership solution. We’re keen to have conversations with other small businesses and communities who might be able to benefit from this approach.”
Kim Mears, Openreach’s managing director for infrastructure delivery, said: “Partnerships like this help us to bring high-speed connections to challenging areas that broadband providers struggle to upgrade alone.
“More than 92 per cent of the UK can access superfast speeds today, and we’re committed to making fibre broadband as widely available as possible in the UK. That’s why we’re investing in hundreds of similar projects across the UK, with more than 280 signed to date, working in partnership with business and residential communities to deliver faster speeds from a wide choice of competing internet service providers.
“It’s great to be able to work with businesses like Newfield Automation in Congleton to find a broadband solution.”
This BT Community Fibre Partnerships scheme is the fifth deal to be signed in Cheshire, joining Ollerton, Tattenhall, Warburton and Kingswood Park in Frodsham communities in bringing fibre broadband to those areas not included in national fibre broadband rollout plans.
For more information on community fibre partnerships with BT, visit www.communityfibre.bt.com
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For further information
Enquiries about this news release should be made to Janet Hare in the BT Regional Press Office on 0800 085 0660 All news releases can be accessed at our web site: http://www.btplc.com/News
Notes to editors
For more information on Newfield Automation, visit www.newfieldautomation.com
About Openreach
Openreach is the UK’s leading digital infrastructure provider.
Its 32,000 employees are responsible for building and maintaining millions of miles of fibre and copper cables that connect every home and business in the UK to local telephone exchanges. Openreach operates and maintains this network to deliver a range of wholesale services for more than 580 retail providers, who in-turn provide telephony, broadband, TV and data services to more than 30 million consumer and business customers throughout the country.
Openreach is a highly regulated business, with more than 90 per cent of its revenues generated from services that are regulated by Ofcom. Any company can access its products under exactly the same prices, terms and conditions.
Over the last decade, Openreach has invested more than £10bn into its network and is currently building the UK’s largest fibre broadband footprint. This technology is available to more than 26 million homes and businesses, with tens of thousands more gaining access each week.
Openreach is a wholly owned and independently governed division of the BT Group. For the year ended 31 March 2017, it reported revenues of £5.1bn.
For more information, visit openreach.co.uk
About BT
BT’s purpose is to use the power of communications to make a better world. It is one of the world’s leading providers of communications services and solutions, serving customers in 180 countries. Its principal activities include the provision of networked IT services globally; local, national and international telecommunications services to its customers for use at home, at work and on the move; broadband, TV and internet products and services; and converged fixed-mobile products and services.BT consists of six customer-facing lines of business: Consumer, EE, Business and Public Sector, Global Services, Wholesale and Ventures, and Openreach.
For the year ended 31 March 2017, BT Group’s reported revenue was £24,062m with
reported profit before taxation of £2,354m.
British Telecommunications plc (BT) is a wholly-owned subsidiary of BT Group plc and encompasses virtually all businesses and assets of the BT Group. BT Group plc is listed on stock exchanges in London and New York.
For more information, visit www.btplc.com
