Original article ISPreview UK:Read More

The Technical Director for rural connectivity provider Wavemobile, Anthony Timson, has complained that the “biggest issue” they face today is the interaction devices roamed onto their network face with respect to the popular WiFi Calling service. Users who roam on to Wave’s network find that the big mobile operators (EE, O2, Vodafone and Three UK) seem to block it.

Just for some context, it’s important to recognise that Wavemobile are a company that specialises in deploying both private and public 2G/4G/5G mobile network services. For example, the provider can deliver community mobile networks to serve remote UK villages (here) and they’ve also worked to extend their cells on to buses in rural parts of the Swansea Bay area (here). Not to mention indoor connectivity solutions.

“Wavemobile is realistically the fifth UK (MNO). I am happy to be corrected on this, but we are a licenced [Radio Access Network] operator with our own MNC, Core, Numbering resources, and DIAMETER/MAP peering into the GSM cloud. We have engineered a practical solution to not-spot coverage that actually works (not perfectly, but that is for another post),” said Anthony.

The provider says they use British made cellXica Ltd M3Q radios for all operators, and can deliver coverage to a hamlet or small village in a “discrete rooftop package” that consumes less than 100 Watts. But the most annoying problem that they experience is the inability to get WiFi Calling to work with the big operators.

Anthony Timson said:

“Our biggest issue today is the interaction devices roamed onto our network face with WiFi Calling. For some reason known only to the big four, if a phone is roamed onto our network and you go inside a building to join WiFi Calling, you are blocked from using it.

This is made worse by the fact that our present solution for that is to deny access to customers affected by this, which means only Emergency Call access – but even denying access to our network still doesn’t allow WiFi Calling. This needs attention by the UK operators as we are lawfully allowed to transmit wherever Ofcom grants us a license. It is [the mobile operators] that [are] preventing use of WiFi calling, not us!

Our team loves solving coverage issues independently of any other operator control. We have had some support, but not where we need it which is on opening up the S6a/S8 or ePDG over cellular interfaces to support a better customer experience.”

ISPreview did ask the big mobile operators to respond to Wavemobile’s concern, but sadly none of them chose to comment. But we have since been informed that the provider may be making some progress, at least with respect to O2 (VMO2); an operator that Wave has worked with a few times before. Time will tell.

Original article ISPreview UK:Read More

The One Touch Switching Company, which is the industry-led company responsible for helping to deliver Ofcom’s solution for easier and quicker UK switching between home broadband and phone providers on different networks (One Touch Switching), will next week pass the milestone of 1.5 million successfully completed migrations since launch (up from 1m in early May 2025).

The OTS system, which went live on 12th September 2024, remains a Gaining Provider Led (GPL) process, where the customer contacts their new (“gaining“) ISP to start and manage the process on their behalf. But despite a bit of a bumpy start, which we won’t recap today, this has now been widely adopted by the vast majority of ISPs; TOTSCo is now working to make a similar switching system available to businesses in “early 2026” (here).

As it stands a total of 337 brands (e.g. broadband ISPs), alongside various Managed Access Providers (MAPs), are now said to be live on TOTSCo’s production directory and the daily switch match success rate is currently hovering around 66% – 69% (up from around 64% back in January 2025). But it should be noted that some failed switches will still get approved later, after corrections are made.

However, it should also be noted that the rate of switching tends to fall a bit during the summer months, before picking up later in the year as we get closer to the Black Friday season of big discounts. This may yet impact the switching success rate of TOTSCo’s Hub.

Paul Bradbury, CEO of TOTSCo, said:

“We’re fast approaching a significant industry milestone — early next week we will reach 1.5 million switches completed through the Hub since the launch of One Touch Switch (OTS). With match rates also edging upwards, OTS is performing strongly. This is a huge achievement and a testament to the collaboration and commitment across the industry to make switching simpler for residential customers.

But this success doesn’t mean we’ll rest on our laurels. Next week, users will see improved reporting performance, making it quicker and smoother to access the data they need. We’ll also be inviting more members to join the OTS Operations Forum — keeping ideas and improvements flowing so OTS stays strong for the future.”

Despite the progress, we’ve noted a few cases where some smaller ISPs continue to lag behind on their adoption or implementation of OTS, which can cause problems for consumers who wish to escape or even join those same providers (Ofcom has yet to take any solid action on this front). In addition, TOTSCo’s messaging platform, including the systems that some ISPs have put in place for engaging with it, still has some room for improvement.

Original article ISPreview UK:Read More

The latest company accounts for broadband ISP Plusnet, which is part of wider BT Group, has revealed that the company’s turnover fell by -15% to £343m in the year to 31st March 2025 (down from £402m last year) and their employee headcount declined by 133 to total 944.

According to the same accounts, the provider’s customer base also fell by 9% following the closure of their mobile service (all mobile operations ended in September 2024). By comparison, the broadband base only declined by a more moderate 3%, which was largely due to Plusnet’s “strategic decision” not to offer its own VoIP style Digital Voice service alongside FTTP broadband.

We always felt as if it was an odd move for Plusnet not to offer an IP based phone service, particularly given how parent BT were a pioneer for this product and they also had a fair few customers on bundles (inc. some vulnerable users). But the results indicate that it was all about “minimising the costs of implementation“.

The 12% fall in the number of employees was also said to have been “driven by the strategic refocus and the necessity to streamline operations“. The BT Group are of course planning to cut many more jobs by 2030.

Original article ISPreview UK:Read More

Fibre optic network supplier Emtelle UK, which is a global manufacturer of blown fibre, cabling and ducted solutions, has been chosen to help supply GoFibre’s new £105m (state aid) Project Gigabit contract for North East Scotland (here), which aims to extend their full fibre broadband (FTTP) network to “around” 63,000 premises in hard-to-reach rural areas.

The two companies already have an established relationship from prior builds, and the new deal extends that to include GoFibre’s expanded rollout. In other words, Emtelle will supply duct, sub-duct and fibre infrastructure for the new full-fibre network – supporting speeds of up to 10Gbps. This will cover parts of Aberdeen City, Aberdeenshire, Angus, Dundee, the Highlands, Moray and Perth and Kinross.

The contract itself was only signed last month, and the first connections aren’t currently set to be delivered until summer 2026. Emtelle and GoFibre are separately also working together to enhance digital connectivity for 8,000 residents and businesses in Hawick.

Gavin Faulds, Chief Commercial Officer of Emtelle Group, said:

“We are delighted to be strengthening our partnership with GoFibre in order to bring full-fibre connectivity to more than 60,000 premises in the North-East of Scotland. As a major Scottish employer, we firmly believe Scotland needs a first-class digital network across every town and village in order to reduce the digital divide and boost economic growth. That is why we are committed to improving its networks, especially for those in rural regions who are the hardest to reach.

Through this partnership with GoFibre, we will provide our market-leading range of award-winning pre-connectorised blown fibre cable and ducted network solutions that not only create high-speed networks but also future-proof them for decades to come. In the long term, we aim to continue our partnership with GoFibre, and build the infrastructure that further transforms connectivity in both Scotland and the UK.”

GoFibre CEO, Neil Conaghan, said:

“Our strategic partnership with Emtelle is an important enabler for GoFibre to deliver our Project Gigabit contract in the north-east of Scotland. GoFibre and Emtelle are both Borders-born, and for two Scottish businesses to play such a crucial role in delivering gigabit connectivity for the country shows the strength of local supply chain. We’re glad to have Emtelle as our strategic infrastructure partner.”

Customers of the new GoFibre service, once live over the next few years, can expect to pay from £22.50 per month for a 150Mbps (30Mbps upload) package on a 24-month term with an included wireless router, which rises to £33 for their top 1000Mbps (100Mbps upload) plan. The latter also comes with a bonus Wi-Fi extender (this can optionally be taken on other plans at extra cost).

Original article ISPreview UK:Read More

In a small but interesting update, the Government’s Building Digital UK (BDUK) agency has announced a string of new studies to evaluate the performance, delivery and value of its various mobile and broadband roll-out programmes – including Project Gigabit (subsidy and vouchers), Local Full Fibre Networks (LFFN), Shared Rural Network (SRN) and GigaHubs (extension of LFFN).

According to the first brief, BDUK has commissioned Winning Moves, Belmana and Darren Kilburn to conduct a comprehensive evaluation of waves 2 and 3 of the £200m Local Full Fibre Networks (LFFN) programme (wave 1 was already evaluated), which helped to extend fibre optic networks to public sector sites. The same network could also be harnessed to help improve local business and home broadband connectivity, albeit requiring separate private investment. The follow-on GigaHubs scheme, under Project Gigabit, will also be separately evaluated by Belmana, Hatch and GC Insights (here).

The second brief reveals that BDUK has commissioned Ipsos UK and partners to undertake an evaluation of the £1bn industry-led Shared Rural Network (SRN) Programme, which has helped to extend geographic 4G mobile coverage from ‘at least one operator’ to 95% of the UK and will continue to expand until the start of 2027. This project involved both the construction of new masts and the sharing of existing ones between the operators.

The third brief confirms that BDUK has commissioned Ipsos UK and partners to undertake an evaluation of their headline £5bn Project Gigabit scheme, which includes the Gigabit Infrastructure Subsidy (GIS) interventions and the Gigabit Broadband Voucher Scheme (GBVS). The overall goal of this has been to help extend gigabit broadband to c.99% of premises by 2032 (recently delayed from the original target of 2030).

Such evaluations are typically conducted periodically, usually once a programme has been up and running for a while (i.e. so there’s actually something to evaluate in the first place). The prior Superfast Broadband (SFBB) programme saw several evaluations and so did related schemes (examples here, here and here), so this is really just a continuation of that approach.

Original article ISPreview UK:Read More

Internet and web hosting provider Freeola has complemented their existing range of Openreach-based broadband (FTTC/P) packages by quietly launching a new range of complementary packages via two alternative networks, Freedom Fibre and CityFibre.

Just to recap. CityFibre’s full fibre (FTTP) network current covers around 4.5 million premises across the UK, while Freedom Fibre’s similar infrastructure covers 350,000 premises across parts of Cheshire, Greater Manchester, Staffordshire, Suffolk, Essex and North Shropshire in England.

The new Freedom Fibre based packages tend to range from around £36.72 per month for symmetric speeds of 100Mbps on a short 30-day term and rise to £55.44 for their top 2300Mbps tier. Oddly the monthly prices for longer 12 and 24 month terms are actually slightly more expensive (normally ISPs entice users to lock-in for longer with lower pricing), although you do get free setup with those (saving £60 one-off).

As for the CityFibre based packages, they range from £32.40 for a symmetric 150Mbps service on a 30-day term and rise up to £50.04 for their top 2300Mbps tier. But once again the 12 and 24 month terms seem to attract a more expensive monthly rental, albeit saving between £30 and £65.28 on the setup fee.

All customers benefit from an included Static IP address, UK based support, unlimited usage and a commitment toward no in-contract price rises. Credits to Simon for the news tip.

Original article ISPreview UK:Read More

Mobile network provider giffgaff, which harnesses O2’s virtual operator (MVNO) platform in the UK, has launched a new promotion that slashes the monthly price of their unlimited data (mobile broadband) plan on an 18-month “flexible” minimum term from £25 to £15 per month.

Ash Schofield, CEO at giffgaff, said: “We’re always looking for ways to improve our SIM plans to make life a little easier for our members, so we’re proud to launch this absolute steal of a deal. Not only that, but while many other network providers increased their prices this year, we stuck to our commitment to no mid-contract price rises.”

As usual the plan also includes unlimited UK calls and texts, inclusive EU roaming up to 5GB, 5G speeds at no extra cost and you can switch your monthly plan up or down whenever you need. Just remember that their “unlimited data” plan is still subject to a Fair Usage Policy (FUP) like most mobile operators and the new £15 offer will only be available to take until 4th December 2025.

The FUP advises customers to “avoid regularly tethering to 12 or more devices or regularly using unreasonably large amounts of data, including but not limited using around 650GB of data twice within a 6-month period.”

Original article Total Telecom:Read More

News

Two pilot projects will see Openreach’s fibre network turn into real-time leak detection grid

The UK’s largest fibre network operator, Openreach, has announced a pair of trials with water companies and tech partners, aiming to use their network to quickly identify costly leaks.

In the first trial, in partnership with Arcadis, Thames Water, and Cadent, Distributed Acoustic Sensing (DAS) technology from FiberSense will be used to pinpoint leaks in both water and gas pipes.

The DAS technology works by measuring the impact of nearby acoustic vibrations on the fibre optic cable’s signal quality. This data is then analysed using machine learning to exclude expected acoustic interference (such as that caused by a car traveling overhead) and identify genuine anomalies like leaks or blockages in nearby pipes.

This technique gives utility companies specific location data about network issues and functions largely as an early warning system, allowing them to tackle problems in a less disruptive manner, before they become emergencies.

According to Cadent, unplanned engineering work to repair these issues costs the UK roughly “£750m every year in terms of economic and social impact”.

The initial trial is running for six months in Hounslow, London, with the potential to expand the project into a London-wide pilot in future.

“Openreach were the obvious choice of telecoms partner for this project. We want to create a model that can be adopted in other UK cities, not just in London. Openreach have the national reach we wanted,” said Sam Bright, Innovation Manager for Thames Water.

FiberSense’s technology is already being used in similar projects worldwide, most notably for monitoring submarine cables such as the upcoming SMAP cable in Australia and the Southern Cross Cable Network in the Pacific.

Openreach’s second, similar project will see the operator partner with Affinity Water, who supplies drinking water to parts of London, eastern and south eastern England, and infrastructure monitoring company Lightsonic. This trial will use Lightsonic’s Distributed Fibre Optic Sensing (DFOS) tech to identify leaks, also through acoustic sensing and subsequent analysis.

The details surrounding this project were more limited, with the location and scope of the trial not yet announced. Nonetheless, it should hopefully contribute to reducing the roughly 3 billion litres of water lot through leakage in the UK each year.

“This is a transformative moment for our leakage strategy. By harnessing Lightsonic’s advanced fibre optic sensing technology and Openreach’s extensive network, we’re unlocking a new era of proactive leak detection,” said James Curtis, Head of Leakage at Affinity Water. “This will help us meet our ambitious leakage reduction targets and deliver a more resilient service to our customers.”

Fibre networks are not the only telco assets that can help to monitor utility infrastructure. In Germany, for example, T-Mobile recently announced a new partnership with Fluid Conservation Systems, using their mobile network to connect to the latter’s acoustic water monitoring sensors.

Also in the news:
US judge rules Huawei must face charges of fraud and racketeering
Optus ditches football rights to focus on telecoms
Nokia launches digital twin platform Enscryb to digitalise energy sector

Original article ISPreview UK:Read More

Mobile network operator 1p Mobile, which is a virtual network operator (MVNO) on EE’s UK platform, currently appears to be suffering from a significant and protracted outage of their website and app services. The situation also seems to be delaying the provider’s ability to activate new SIMs.

The outage, which appears to have started sometime last night, means that customers attempting to access 1p Mobile’s website are today being greeted by the somewhat generic “500 – Internal server error” message – a common HTTP notice that tends to cover a multitude of potential causes.

Initially we couldn’t find any service status messages about the situation from 1p via their social media channels, but after a bit of digging we did find this response to one of their customers. A 1p Mobile support agent said (9:09am): “Unfortunately our web servers crashed overnight. We currently do not know what has caused this however, we are working to have everything back up and running as soon as possible. If you are trying to top-up, you can still use our Top-up by Text method. If you send the word TOPUP to 07950014111 it will add £10 to your balance.”

Original article ISPreview UK:Read More

Alternative network operator and UK ISP Highland Broadband (formerly Lothian Broadband), which is deploying a 10Gbp capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) network across rural parts of the Scottish Highlands, has today announced that they’ve secured a £50m funding boost to help support a “major expansion” of their network “throughout rural Scotland“.

The new funding includes £40 million coming from Alpha Real Capital, which is a specialist real assets investment firm, and a further £10 million from the Scottish National Investment Bank (SNIB). The announcement has been welcomed by Scotland’s Deputy First Minister, Kate Forbes, who was present to unveil the funding boost.

The new funding is said to “ensure” that Highland Broadband has the capital as well as the capability and capacity to continue the expansion of its fibre network across rural Scotland. The provider added that it remains “on track to extend its reach to over 150 towns and villages” across rural Scotland in the coming year.

The announcement claims that Highland Broadband “already connects around 50% of all rural premises in the Scottish Highlands“, although we think the words covered or passed would have been more reflective. Data from the Highland Council indicates that, in 2021, the Highlands were home to 110,743 households and around 20,000 business premises.

Deputy First Minister said:

“This is a significant success story for Scotland. The roll-out of Highland Broadband’s network has made a real difference to people and businesses in rural areas, supporting jobs and boosting economic growth.”

I am delighted to see substantial new investment flowing into the company and the rural communities it serves, including a further £10 million from the Scottish National Investment Bank. This takes the Bank’s total investment to £60 million, which has helped Highland Broadband raise an additional £40 million of private capital.

Commercial investment in future-proofed broadband infrastructure is a key part of Scotland’s digital strategy. We are working with operators like Highland Broadband to expand full fibre coverage, while also targeting public funding where it is needed most to support communities the length and breadth of Scotland.”

Gavin Rodgers, CEO of Highland Broadband, added:

“This injection of £50 million of new capital means we have the funding as well as the capability to continue network expansion throughout rural Scotland.

We are delighted to secure the backing of Alpha Real as a new funder and also welcome the ongoing support of the Scottish National Investment Bank.

Raising this capital ahead of a series of important projects means we can focus on operational delivery rather than sourcing further finance.”

In addition, Alpha Real’s Head of Alternative Credit, Brad Bauman, said that they were attracted to invest in the company due to its “highly differentiated business model, quality of the platform and the experienced management team“.

Customers of the service typically pay from £39.99 per month (discounted to £29.99) for an unlimited 150Mbps (symmetric) service on a 24-month term, which rises up to £79.99 (discounted to £49.99) for their 900Mbps tier or £139.99 (discounted to £89.99) if you want their top 5Gbps tier! Various phone, pay TV and mesh WiFi solutions can also be added at an extra cost.

The higher than usual pricing reflects the remote rural nature of their build area. But the provider also offers up to £600 in “switching credit” to new customers, which is an impressive amount to help cover any early termination charges from your old ISP.