UK to smash half-million broadband milestone

By Graeme Wearden, ZDNet.co.uk, 24 April, 2002 15:02

NEWS

Telecoms regulator Oftel is poised to announce that there are more than half a million mass-market broadband users in Britain -- a sign that the UK could be catching up with other countries in the high-speed Internet stakes. Oftel is expected to publish its latest statistics of Internet use in the UK within the next few days, and sources have indicated that these figures will show that at least 500,000 people have got broadband at home. This means that the number of people with broadband at home is rising fast, as three months ago there were only around 340,000 broadband-enabled UK consumers. Consumer broadband services have been available in Britain for around two years, but until recently take-up has been disappointingly slow. The 500,000 mark is a significant milestone in the journey towards Broadband Britain, and is likely to please the telecoms industry, Oftel and the government. These "mass-market broadband" users will have signed up with cable firms ntl or Telewest, or with an Internet Service Provider that offers a broadband product based on BT Wholesale's ADSL product. One significant factor behind the rapid increase is the price cuts made by BT Wholesale back in February. This has led to a surge in demand -- retailers are running low on ADSL modems and BT is dealing with more than 10,000 new ADSL customers a week. In a speech to the Social Market Foundation last week, David Edmonds, Oftel's director general, said that there were at least 460,000 broadband users in the UK. "Over 180,000 consumers now use ADSL while over 280,000 consumers have high speed services using cable modems," said Edmonds. According to Oftel, the ADSL figure quoted by Edmonds referred to data from mid-April and the cable figure referred to data given at the start of April. Given that more than 10,000 people are signing up for ADSL each week, and the cable companies have also been experiencing strong growth in broadband take-up, it is likely that the UK is set to smash through the figure of 500,000 broadband users imminently, if it hasn't already. An Oftel spokeswoman would not confirm that the regulator was about to announce that the UK had reached the 500,000 mark. "We'd be delighted if we did manage to reach it," she said. BT Retail's new "no-frills" broadband is expected to go on sale this autumn, bringing BT's target of one million broadband users by summer 2003 further within reach. E-commerce and technology companies expect to benefit greatly once broadband becomes a widely used way of connecting to the Net, as it makes content like video and high-quality audio more attractive. Bill Gates, Microsoft's chairman, said last week that he believes it is extremely important that homes have high-speed Internet capability. "If there's a breakthrough in hardware that we're not getting fast enough, it's broadband capability," Gates said. "Even that over the next five years I expect to be tackled." British organisations, particularly Oftel and BT, have been criticised for failing to make broadband available and attractive for UK consumers, even as other countries quickly rolled out the technology. In Europe, Germany had more than one million broadband connections at the beginning of this year, while France had more than 500,000 broadband connections, according to Gartner. South Korea has the world's biggest broadband population, with more than 50 percent of its 14.3 million households connected to a high-speed line.

See the Broadband News Section for the latest on cable modems, ADSL, satellite and other high-speed access technologies, including a comprehensive guide to the best deals out there. Have your say instantly, and see what others have said. Go to the Telecoms forum. Let the editors know what you think in the Mailroom.

Post your comment

In order to post a comment you need to be registered and logged in.

You can also log in with Facebook. Log in or create your ZDNet UK account below

By signing up for this service, you indicate that you agree to our Terms and Conditions and have read and understood our Privacy Policy. Questions about membership? Find the answers in the Community FAQ

ZDNet UK Live

Don't forget to check out apps like GoodReader or SlideShark either, they're indispensible for people on the go in presentation situations. Best...

1 hour ago by tinycg on Four top iPad apps for people on the move

Well it seems there is something a number of us agree on. Why is the Ubuntu Unity launcher so ugly? I thought perhaps it was something to do with...

6 hours ago by TerryRK on A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

Duplicate comments are not made intentionally. Its very good to know that now you are keeping check on this problem because sometimes a commenter...

15 hours ago by Freebies202 on Microsoft fixes blog comments, speeds up blogs with open source

"the very significant number of users" and "many (most) of us" - you have no evidence for these statements. It is a fact that most users are saying...

23 hours ago by kevinmchapman on A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

Another grammar faux pas is the improper use of "you". When sitting down down in a restaurant, for example, I get cringe when the waitress...

1 day ago by Marg Menzies Harrison via Facebook on 10 flagrant grammar mistakes that make you look stupid

And NOW, folks, for Canonical's next trick... Kubuntu is late. Here's a pencil. Draw your own conclusions. cf.:...

1 day ago by zdnetukuser on Linux Minterface

@kevinmchapman. The discussion here reflects the very significant number of users who really do like the traditional menu system and who wish to...

1 day ago by Moley on A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

Er, no... It is an efficient means of finding the application/file/setting you need in one place. The icons are a simply a fallback for when you...

1 day ago by kevinmchapman on A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

Isn't the provision of a text based search an admission by the developers that the mass of icons approach does not work? I don't need to use a...

1 day ago by TerryRK on A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

"Unity and GNOME 3 both abandon the old text-based cascading menus in favour of a graphical icon-driven system." Point truly missed. Both use a...

1 day ago by kevinmchapman on A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

whs001 - Thank you, I'm glad you liked the article. I absolutely agree with you on your first point. I should perhaps have made it clearer that...

1 day ago by TerryRK on A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

If we allow corporate interest to dictate the way our government circumvents due process against foreign entities then we should accept the same...

1 day ago by Dennis Nilsson via Facebook on ACTA stumbles in Germany

I totally dislike pirating of works, I fear that artists will be deterred from creating works if they think that they are going to get ripped off....

1 day ago by GHar123 on ACTA stumbles in Germany

How dare film makers, artists or anybody that invests in creativity stop us pirating their works for free. I want to be able to walk into my local...

2 days ago by JCB33 on ACTA stumbles in Germany

@GrueMaster. I prefer horses for courses rather than one size fits all. I, and I suspect most other computer users, do not really wish to have...

2 days ago by Moley on A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

The product that scares me every time I have to use it is the Office 2007 version of Excel. The first bug that I found was applying the median...

2 days ago by greycynic on Ten flawed products that derail productivity

Nice review and very informative. One thing I'd like to add (in reply to whs001's 1st question), the main reason to have the same interface from...

2 days ago by GrueMaster on A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

I'be been using Mint 12 since the RC came out, and I am far more happy with the Cinnamon, the Mate, and, yes (with extensions), theGnome 3...

2 days ago by Frederick Wrigley via Facebook on A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

Excellent article. One small correction, though--although a fresh installation of Linux Mint 12 will, indeed, provide the user with a version of...

2 days ago by bdantas on A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

In related news, the ISPs club together to get the members of the Home Affairs Select Committee (ya goofed on that part, ZDNet UK) copies of "The...

2 days ago by Alan Ralph via Facebook on MPs urge ISPs to take down terrorist material

Featured white papers

Latest jobs

UK to smash half-million broadband milestone

Daily Newsletters

Topics

Related stories

Broadband prices to halve by 1 April

BT unveils no-frills budget broadband

Heart of England NHS begins massive digitisation plan

Hard-drive woes hit PC shipments in fourth quarter

Post your comment

ZDNet UK Live

Latest in IT Strategy

Heart of England NHS begins massive digitisation plan

Hard-drive woes hit PC shipments in fourth quarter

Featured white papers

Latest jobs

PHP Web Developer - html, css, javascript

Java Developer, Online Gaming, London

Quant Dev, Hedge Fund, FX, Excel VBA

Inside ZDNet UK

A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

2012 Predictions: VCE FastPath, VI SAN Probe & Hadoop

BlackBerry Bold 9790

Make faster, smarter decisions using BI

Ten factors that make Ubuntu 11.10 a hit

Toshiba Portégé Z830-10P Review

BT's archive: Pictures from the vault

News & Analysis

Reviews

Blogs

Resources

About Us

Member Services

Special Features

Advertising Features

ZDNet UK / News and Analysis / Business of IT / IT Strategy

UK to smash half-million broadband milestone

Daily Newsletters

Topics

Related stories

Post your comment

Get ZDNet UK's daily newsletter

Enter your email address to sign up

ZDNet UK Live

Latest in IT Strategy

Featured white papers

Latest jobs

Inside ZDNet UK

Resources

About Us

Member Services

Special Features

Advertising Features