County Broadband was delighted to welcome Saffron Walden MP and cabinet minister The Rt Hon Kemi Badenoch to High Easter in Essex where the local community provider is delivering full fibre digital infrastructure building on its multi-million-pound private investment from Aviva Investors.
During the tour Kemi was shown the new world-class infrastructure being built across five villages in her constituency which can deliver gigabit broadband speeds and superior network reliability with thousands of homes and businesses set to benefit. Speeds can also be increased further in the future as demand grows without the need for further civil engineering works.
County Broadband is designing, building and deploying its network in rural communities and continues to invest in local talent, doubling its workforce in the past year. The alternative network (alt-net) provider has committed to connect half a million rural premises across the East of England to its network by 2027.
The Rt Hon Kemi Badenoch MP commented:
“Better broadband for our towns and villages has been one of my key priorities since I first got elected and it was great to meet with County Broadband to discuss full fibre broadband in High Easter and their plans for villages across the constituency.
“In 2023, broadband is a utility and something we all rely on constantly in our everyday lives. There are still local communities across Chelmsford and Uttlesford that require a better broadband connection, and I will continue to work with providers and the Government to ensure they receive it.”
Lloyd Felton, Founder and Chief Executive of County Broadband, commented: “We were very pleased to meet with The Rt Hon Kemi Badenoch MP in High Easter and provide updates about our full fibre rollout activity in her constituency and our exciting plans for the wider region.
“It was heartening to receive Kemi’s support as a local MP and it is reassuring that she retains such interest in her local constituency. Kemi is not only the local MP to the area but was also recently appointed Secretary of State for Business and Trade. This made it an even prouder moment for me when Kemi was very gracious in her praise for how the business has grown into one of the region’s most successful SMEs.
“The UK’s digital infrastructure is a central pillar for boosting economic growth and we’ve seen unprecedented demand for faster and more reliable speeds with the shift to remote working and the growth of online platforms. We fully support the government’s drive to ensure everyone has access to the speeds they need in this changing economy.
“Building this infrastructure takes time which is why we must future-proof today. We have ambitious plans for the East of England and we look forward to continuing to work closely with the government department of Science, Innovation and Technology, which has responsibility for broadband delivery in the UK, to ensure our continued growth as a local business is aligned to its political imperative to support gigabit broadband delivery for everyone in the UK.”
Ofcom recently* announced new guidance to help the consumer identify the difference between full-fibre services which County Broadband are offering, and the much slower part-fibre networks offered by others. This new guidance addresses misleading advertising by national providers promoting copper-based fibre-to-the-cabinet (FTTC) services as ‘fibre broadband’ when in reality it is much slower ‘superfast’ broadband, that still uses outdated Victorian copper wires to connect to the home.
In contrast, County Broadband’s full fibre networks uses fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) infrastructure where fibre optic cables are installed directly into premises, which has the capability to have almost limitless download and upload speeds in future. County Broadband is currently offering broadband packages over its full fibre networks with a choice of speeds of up to a guaranteed 1,000 Mbps.
County Broadband, based in Aldham, near Colchester in Essex, was founded in 2003 and is designing, building and deploying its rural full fibre networks across Essex, Norfolk, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire, as part of a long-term commitment to digitally future-proof the East of England.
Residents and businesses can check if they are covered in County Broadband’s rollout by entering their postcode at www.countybroadband.co.uk where they can also register their interest in finding out more about the service.
*https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0032/254984/broadband-info-guidance.pdf
