2022 has been quite the year! Alongside our continued work to deliver full-fibre broadband across Essex, Suffolk, Cambridgeshire and Norfolk, we’ve also supported key industry events and expanded our teams, both internally and through build partnerships.
2023 will welcome a lot of exciting news for County Broadband but, before the New Year, we’ve taken a look at some our highlights for 2022.
£100m investment
Following an initial £46m injection in 2018, we secured a second investment of £100m from Aviva Investors at the start of the year. This is part of a long-term commitment to digitally future-proof the East of England through designing and building new fibre-to-the-premises networks.
The additional funding has aided us in expanding the scope of our full-fibre rollout, building towards our goal of connecting half a million homes and businesses by the end of 2027.
Over 200 new villages connected
Speaking of the rollout, we’ve had a busy year connecting premises and spreading the unrivalled speeds and reliability of full-fibre broadband. Throughout Suffolk, Essex, Norfolk and Cambridgeshire, we’re proud to have connected well over 200 villages.
We’ve also been supporting families, businesses and even events like the 105th Tendring Show where we supplied Wi-Fi access for 20,000 attendees.
100 new employees and counting
Our full-fibre network isn’t the only thing that’s expanded this year. As a team, we’ve welcomed 100 new employees as we continue to invest in top talent to support our ambitious plans for the region.
We’ve filled positions across the company from network operations, engineering, customer services to IT and finance.
This is the result of a number of drivers, not least the launch of our career hub – a space dedicated to starting and building careers at all levels in one of the fastest growing industries.
2 major conferences
Not only have we kept our fingers on the pulse for exciting news and conferences across the world of telecoms, but we’ve also been a part of it. This year saw two County Broadband team members representing our name at major trade expositions across the UK, discussing crucial industry hot topics and what we’re doing to help deliver the UK’s gigabit target.
September saw our Chief Commercial Officer Simon Hughes take part on an expert panel at the annual Connected Britain conference where rural inequality was the primary discussion. Simon spoke on the vital work undertaken by County Broadband to close the gap between rural and urban areas regarding digital connectivity.
In November, our Regulatory Policy and Reporting Manager Katie Crellin also featured on an expert panel – this time at the annual Independent Networks Conference Association (INCA). The discussion focussed on legislative and regulatory issues and Katie shared key insights during a time of change within the industry.
New build partnerships
Our work to connect premises across the East of England is supported by build partnerships to deliver the full-fibre infrastructure.
2022 saw us announce two new build partners to aid our rollout with NGE and Highway Workforce leading construction in Norfolk.
These partnerships have helped us continue building momentum in our goal to digitally future-proof the East of England, undertaking bespoke projects to suit each connected community and replace outdated copper cables with the modern age of full-fibre.
From County Broadband to you, we hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas and a fantastic New Year. We have exciting plans for 2023, so stay tuned and we’ll see you there!
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