Original article ISPreview UK:Read More

Network analyst firm Streetwave has today shared the results from a recent survey they conducted, which examined the coverage and performance of 4G and 5G mobile (broadband) networks – including EE, Three UK, Vodafone and O2 – for people travelling on part of the Elizabeth Line (train) from Heathrow Airport (T 2/3) to Canary Wharf.

The rail route involved in this study has, over the past couple of years, benefitted from significant upgrades as part of Transport for London‘s (TfL) wider project to extend 4G and 5G mobile signals across the London Underground (i.e. stations, tube trains and tunnels etc.). In the past, the possibility of maintaining a mobile signal on this line would have been an exercise in frustration, but today things are very different.

Streetwave is understood to have taken their portable data collection equipment onboard for just one of these trips, thus the results below should be considered quite anecdotal, albeit still interesting. The test was also conducted during the morning rush hour period (i.e. the train was full for most of the journey), starting at 7:51am on 23rd May at Heathrow Airport.

The train itself was a British Rail Class 345 Aventra operated by MTR Elizabeth line. All four of the UK’s mobile operators were measured and their ‘Essential Coverage‘ scores across the journey were as follows. Streetwave defines Essential Coverage as being reflective of locations where the network provides users with speeds of above 1Mbps download, 0.5Mbps upload, and below 100ms (milliseconds) of latency (i.e. covering or allowing only the most basic of use cases / needs).

Essential Coverage Achieved on the Elizabeth Line
1. EE – 86%
2. Vodafone – 80%
3. O2 – 65%
4. Three UK – 49%

Put another way, the company’s simulated passenger on each network spent the following amount of time with a dependable internet connection on the 48-minute journey: EE – 41 minutes, Vodafone – 38 minutes, O2 – 31 minutes and Three UK – 24 minutes.

Clearly EE and Vodafone are doing well here, while there’s plenty of room for improvement with respect to Three UK (they probably haven’t activated their network on all the segments yet, as it’s shared infrastructure). The study also tracked the average (median) mobile broadband download speeds of each operator, which naturally showed a fairly positive result for three of the four major mobile networks.

Median Download Speeds by Mobile Operator
1. Vodafone – 35 Mbps
2. EE – 25 Mbps
3. O2 – 19 Mbps
4. Three UK – 11 Mbps

Once again, it’s important to stress that this is a very positive outcome, given how we’re talking about a line that runs mostly underground, and the tests were conducted during the morning rush hour (i.e. the highest network load). The fact this works at all is impressive and even Three UK’s speed is enough to do most basic tasks, even if their ability to maintain that connection still needs work.

The Elizabeth Line stretches over 100 km – connecting Reading, Heathrow, Canary Wharf and Essex to Central London. It carries over 4 million passengers a week, making it one of the busiest railways in the country.

Original article Total Telecom:Read More

Original article ISPreview UK:Read More

The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) has this morning revealed that a total of 50 government-funded rural 4G (mobile broadband) mast upgrades have now gone live across England (9 masts), Wales (28) and Scotland (13) as part of the industry-led £1bn Shared Rural Network (SRN) project. But 50 more will follow by March 2026.

The SRN – supported by £501m of public funding and £532m of private investment from operators – involves both the reciprocal sharing of existing masts in certain areas and the demand-led building and sharing of new masts in others between the operators. The target is to extend geographic 4G coverage (aggregate) to 95% of the UK by the end of 2025 (5G will also benefit from the new infrastructure).

Most of the early work on this project has typically involved private investment from the main mobile network operators, but over the past two years we’ve also seen government-funded mast upgrades and new site builds taking place in other parts of the country. A total of 50 mast upgrades have now gone live across the UK via government funding (up from 39 in late February 2025).

This phase of the work focuses on the part of the SRN that sees the government providing a total of £184m from their pot to the Home Office and mobile network operators, which is helping to upgrade Extended Area Service (EAS) masts being built as part of the 4G Emergency Services Network (ESN) – these masts previously only connected EE customers and anyone making 999 calls (i.e. all mobile operators can now use these sites).

The areas benefitting are:

England

• Bishop Auckland
• Carlisle
• Hexham
• Penrith and Solway
• South Shropshire
• Thirsk and Malton
• Whitehaven and Workington

Wales

• Bangor Aberconwy
• Brecon, Radnor and Cwm Tawe
• Caerfyrddin
• Ceredigion Preseli
• Dwyfor Meirionnydd
• Monmouthshire
• Montgomeryshire and Glyndwr 

Scotland

• Argyll, Bute and South Lochaber
• Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock
• Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk
• Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale

Wales has thus far seen the biggest connectivity boost from all this work, with remote parts of the Berwyn Mountains, Brecon Beacons and the Clwydian Range and Dee Valley now covered by all four UK mobile networks (O2, Vodafone, Three UK and EE). It sometimes takes more than a single mast to properly cover each area.

Since the SRN began in March 2020, over 10,000 sq km have gained 4G coverage for the first time. Almost 35,000 sq km across the UK now have coverage from all four operators, including over 3,500 sq km in Wales, which is covering roughly 20% of the country.

Telecoms Minister, Sir Chris Bryant, said:

“The growth potential of our areas of outstanding natural beauty must not be stunted by patchy internet.

This milestone is a major step forward for better connectivity for all corners of the UK meaning everyone can reap the benefits of the digital age. From boosting tourism and business opportunities to providing safer outdoors experiences for visitors to our treasured countryside.”

Ben Roome, CEO of Mova, said:

“This is a big milestone for rural mobile coverage. Thanks to strong collaboration between government and industry, 50 publicly funded masts are now live — including this one in Upper Chapel — helping to close the mobile coverage gap for residents, businesses and visitors.

These masts build on the success of the mobile operators hitting their industry-funded targets a year early. Since the Shared Rural Network began, coverage from all four operators has grown from 66% to 81% of the UK — an increase the size of Wales and Northern Ireland combined.

With further sites being upgraded and built over the next two years, more people in rural areas will benefit from better mobile coverage.”

However, today’s announcement does cause some slight confusion, not least by failing to define some of its coverage figures. For example, Mova’s quote states that UK coverage from all four operators has grown to 81%, while the PR later says that the SRN is already “delivering to 95% of UK landmass a year ahead of schedule“. But that 95% figure only reflects 4G coverage from a single operator, not all mobile operators.

Ofcom’s licence obligations actually commit each individual operator to increase their 4G coverage to 90% of the UK’s landmass by January 2027 – with these individual obligations supporting the overall target. A further 50 more government funded sites in England, Wales and Scotland are thus now being targeted for upgrades by March 2026.

The programme has so far improved 4G mobile coverage for an extra 280,000 premises and 16,000km of roads, and 100 more government funded mast activations are planned until January 2027.

Shared Rural Network 4G Coverage Progress – Spring 2025

Original article Total Telecom:Read More

As part of the new contract, MLL will also continue to enhance Fife Council’s connections at 150 schools. An immediate focus is the provision of a secure and resilient cloud-based connectivity service to support the Council’s ‘Transforming Learning’ initiative which involves the roll out of around 36,000 iPad computers to schools from now through March 2026.

The iPads and school infrastructure represent a £50million commitment over the next 10 years from Fife Council’s capital and revenue budgets. The digital learning and inclusion initiative will ensure all primary and high school students from P6 through to S7 receive an iPad which can be used in school as well as remotely.    

Additionally, MLL will continue to cost-effectively upgrade Fife Council’s MPLS network with the implementation of fibre connections. Where possible, Fife will leverage the grants and funding for fibre connectivity available from Gigabit Scotland and the UK Government.      

Andrew Milne, Infrastructure Manager, Fife Council, said: “Over the years MLL has reliably provided network services to transition and transform our wide area network and we are confident they will continue to support its evolution and enable the services we wish to deliver in the future. Our Transforming Learning programme is a good example of our commitment to leveraging the network for delivering social value, ensuring school students from all backgrounds have access to secure digital devices when studying at school or at home.”   

Kirste Johnston, MLL’s Strategic Client Director for Scotland & Northern England, added: “We are proud to be continuing our long relationship with Fife Council and to be playing an important role in evolving the network to support digital learning and teaching in schools as well as future initiatives.” 

Fife Council’s WAN service is fully supported by MLL’s centralised Network Operations Centre based in Marlow, Buckinghamshire and regional team in Scotland, including Client Management, Technical Consultancy, Project Management, Service Management and local Field Engineers.

Original article Total Telecom:Read More

News 

A government backed push to expand the UK’s digital infrastructure is attracting criticism from environmental groups, following approval of a £10 billion data centre complex in Northumberland, The Telegraph has reported 

The £10 billion development announced last September, will see ten data centres built across a 133-acre site. Backed by US investment giant Blackstone and led by infrastructure firm QTS, the site is expected to emit around 184,000 tonnes of CO2 per year – a total higher than that produced by Birmingham Airport. 

Planning documents show the facility will double industrial emissions in Northumberland and contribute 12% of the county’s total emissions by 2030. 

The project is part of a broader government strategy to accelerate digital growth and support AI. Since September 2023, data centres have been classified as critical national infrastructure, with the government working to develop an “AI growth zones” strategy to encourage more deployments and eliminate restrictions. 

Earlier this year, a Ciena survey of global data centre leaders found that bandwidth demand is expected to grow sixfold over the next five years, largely driven by AI-related computing. While these facilities are becoming essential for digital infrastructure, their growing energy demands have sparked concerns about long-term sustainability and power consumption. 

Campaigners say the government’s approach could come at a serious environmental cost. The UK is legally bound to reach net zero carbon emissions by 2050, and critics argue projects of this scale risk derailing local and national targets. 

“It is difficult to see how the Government plans to reach its manifesto commitment of hitting net zero by 2050 when it is approving construction projects that add the impact of a major regional airport to our annual emissions,” said Martha Dark, of the non-profit group Foxglove. 

Data centres consume huge amounts of electricity to power and cool thousands of servers. While renewable energy is the cleanest option, it’s not always reliable or available when needed. 

Sources such as wind and solar cannot produce power all the time, and the UK’s energy grid is not yet set up to store or deliver enough renewable power around the clock. Until that changes, there’s a risk that big developments like the Blyth site will still rely partly on fossil fuels, making it harder to cut emissions overall. Microsoft and Google, both of whom are investing heavily in data centres globally, reported higher carbon emissions in their latest annual reports, despite clean energy commitments. 

A Government spokesperson defended the decision, saying “Our Clean Power Action Plan  (the UK government’s strategy to achieve a mostly fossil fuel-free electricity system by 2030) will enable the development of new energy intensive industries such as data centres, helping to grow the economy. 

“Advanced modular reactors will play a particularly important role in growing energy-hungry sectors like AI and we’re shaking up the planning rules to make it easier to build nuclear power stations across the country.” 

Join us at Connected Britain, 24-25 September in London. Tickets available here  

Also in the news:
AT&T agrees $5.75 billion deal for Lumen’s consumer fibre assets
FullFibre withdraws from Project Gigabit contracts
SWR deploys Europe’s first ’Rail-5G’ Wi-Fi

Original article Total Telecom:Read More

News 

UK altnet FullFibre has withdrawn from two government-backed Project Gigabit contracts, impacting planned broadband rollout in some of England’s hardest-to-reach areas 

In two statements released this week, Building Digital UK (BDUK) confirmed that it had “mutually agreed” with FullFibre to end a pair of multi-million pound Project Gigabit contracts covering. 

The first deal aimed to cover 7,900 rural premises across West Herefordshire and the Forest of Dean, and was worth £23.4 million; the second, covering 4,400 rural premises in the Peak District, was worth £10.7 million.Project Gigabit is the UK government’s £5 billion programme to subsidise gigabit-capable broadband in areas that are categorised as unviable for commercial deployment. FullFibre was among several altnets awarded regional contracts through the scheme.  

“BDUK is now moving swiftly to put in place alternative plans with other suppliers to connect premises that were due to be covered by this contract,” the agency said. 

BDUK added that it remains committed to ensuring the affected premises are connected on schedule, with new suppliers expected to be appointed soon. 

The reasons for FullFibre’s withdrawal have not been disclosed, but it is likely linked to a combination of commercial pressures and delivery complexity.  

FullFibre was due to connect the first of its Project Gigabit premises by the end of 2024, but it is unclear if any homes have been built out. 

Connecting remote rural properties is often much more expensive than urban builds, and altnets across the UK are increasingly cautious, as investor funding tightens and rollout costs rise.  

In fact, FullFibre is not the first altnet forced to abandon its Project Gigabit ambitions, with both Voneus and Freedom Fibre having cancelled similar contracts in the past six months. 

Join us at Connected Britain, 24-25 September in London. Tickets available here  

Also in the news:
SWR deploys Europe’s first ’Rail-5G’ Wi-Fi  
BT accelerates fibre rollout amid cost cuts
AT&T agrees $5.75 billion deal for Lumen’s consumer fibre assets

Original article ISPreview UK:Read More

A few years have passed since the South Western Railway (SWR) announced that it would deploy a new rail-side 5G mast network (here), which aimed to deliver “superfast” onboard WiFi for people travelling on a 70km long stretch of their Main Line into London (between Basingstoke and Earlsfield). But after some delays, the new network is now live.

The original announcement, which involved the roll-out of a “Rail-5G” solution (i.e. special track-side 5G mobile / radio pole masts that are used to supply data capacity for onboard WiFi), envisaged the new network – backed by FirstGroup’s rail division – as being completed during “early 2023“. But clearly it ended up taking a bit longer than that to deliver.

According to the latest update, customers can on that stretch of line can now enjoy “unprecedented internet speeds up to 20 times faster than the current average“, as it becomes the “first train operator in Europe to introduce rail-5G Wi-Fi” (we have seen other train operators using similar solutions before). But that reference to “20 times faster” should perhaps be taken in context of SWR’s previously quite flaky onboard WiFi (speaking from personal experience).

On the other hand, SWR did previously trial the solution on the Isle of Wight, which is said to have been able to “consistently deliver” broadband speeds (throughput) of 1Gbps to a moving train (i.e. shared capacity for commuters and the train operator). The new Rail-5G network is separately described as being a “multi-gigabit internet solution“.

Peter Williams, Customer and Commercial Director for SWR, said:

“We’re thrilled that our customers travelling between Earlsfield and Basingstoke are the first to benefit from this unprecedented superfast Wi-Fi.

Customers can now stream, download files, video call, and much more – without worrying about their connection.

Whether travelling for work or leisure, having access to a strong and reliable internet connection will make their time on board more productive and enjoyable.

We hope this will make travelling by train an even more attractive option, helping to get people out of cars and onto the rail network.”

SWR highlights how polling conducted by Ipsos found that 41% of UK adults would be more likely to consider taking the train over other modes of transport if train companies provided fast, reliable on-board Wi-Fi. The figure is even higher among younger people, rising to 64% of those aged 16-24 and 59% of those aged 25-34.

Original article Total Telecom:Read More

Press Release

London, UK – 19 May 2025 – Vyntelligence (Vyn®) today marks a historical milestone by unveiling Agentic Video Intelligence. This first of its kind technology is set to revolutionise field operations and customer experience with autonomous, intelligent workflows.

This comes at a time when the UK is preparing to invest £700 billion in infrastructure and assets. From the UK’s AMP8 regulatory cycle, Clean Power 2030 Action Plan, and continued investment in grid and mains upgrades, infrastructure remains the backbone of the UK’s Net Zero transition.

But with critical skill shortages and trillions in physical assets to deploy and maintain, legacy systems and processes are no longer fit for purpose. Paper trails, form-filling, and fragmented workflows slow down the very teams tasked with delivering the future of infrastructure. This demands smarter delivery – safer, faster, greener. Vyntelligence is rewriting the playbook.

Unveiled at Utility Week Live, Agentic Video Intelligence replaces outdated interfaces with the most natural one: video. Using video, frontline teams and even consumers can now “show and tell”. No more forms, no more friction. Problems are captured, connected and closed in real time, with Vyn® AI agents orchestrating work without delays.

Vyn® System of Video Agents include Vyn® Quality Agent, Vyn® Safety Agent, Vyn® Job Admin Agent, Vyn® Triage Agent, and Vyn® Collaboration Agent. These work together to ensure Right First Time delivery, boost safety through real-time awareness, eliminate admin, and speed up fault triage. They also connect teams across design, maintenance, and asset health – turning fragmented workflows into seamless action. Together, Vyn® AI Agents simplify and speed up the frontline work.

Already trusted by 90% of top UK utilities, telco and retail enterprises, Vyntelligence offers these intelligent workflows built on years of verticalised, ethically sourced, user-generated video data and rich context awareness that deliver dashboards and insights at the edge.

“We’re proud to partner with the world’s leading infrastructure providers and their ecosystem partners to build the data and asset intelligence backbone for a smarter, more resilient future,” said Kapil Singhal, co-founder and CEO of Vyntelligence. “With Agentic Video Intelligence, we’re transforming how work gets done in complex, underserved environments, making insight accessible where it’s needed most and where we have severe lack of expert resources. For the first time, frontline teams can simply show and tell with Vyn®. Vyn® enhances process efficiency by acting as a virtual on-site expert. Leveraging the high information density of video, Vyn® AI can watch, listen and interpret. Through integrations, it tracks status changes, while smart search and prompts provide access to relevant information about a site, asset, or specific moment.“

Vyntelligence continues to deliver on its stated purpose of simplifying and speeding up frontline work, carefully balancing people, profit and the planet. Building happier customers, contractors and colleagues.

Book a 15 min call with one of our experts to find out more.

###

About Vyntelligence: 

Vyntelligence (Vyn^®) is the market-leading Agentic Video Intelligence Work Platform, designed for customers, contractors and colleagues. Vyn Simplifies and Speeds up work with short video data capture and Agentic Video Intelligence.

Top 80% of UK utilities, telecoms, and retail clients use Vyn^®, creating trusted engagement by simplifying and speeding up work to optimise asset life cycles.

Vyntelligence powers collaboration across multibillion dollar worth of assets. Vyn® harnesses insights from 200+ contractor firms, thousands of colleagues and millions of retail consumers. Vyn® purposefully balances profit and the planet by saving field visits, upskilling people and making lives safer at work.

Vyn® turns field videos — prompted before, during, and after work — into automated workflows, such as invoicing and work instructions. Its AI-driven insights help businesses improve pricing accuracy, speed up delivery, ensure safety, and maintain compliance.

As a pioneer in Video Intelligence, Vyn has the largest expertly-curated short-video knowledge base, integrating advanced Generative AI models across video, vision, and speech.

Vyn® is proud to partner with game changer clients, such as EDP, Total Energies, Cadent Gas, Scotia Gas, Suez, Northumbrian Water, Severn Trent, Openreach, Vodafone, and UK Power Networks.

Recognised as a Gartner Cool Vendor 2023, Vyn holds US patents for Smart Data Capture and AI-driven insights.

Vyn^® SmartVideoNotes^® and Vyntelligence are registered trademarks of humanLearning Ltd.

For press enquiries, please contact us at isha@vyntelligence.com

Original article ISPreview UK:Read More

Alternative network provider Wildanet, which has spent the past few years deploying a new Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) based gigabit broadband network across rural parts of Cornwall and Devon in England, has announced plans to conduct a “phased retirement” of their legacy Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) network.

Just to recap. The internet provider, which has recently suffered some job losses (here) and is currently in the process of changing CEO (here), originally started life in 2017 as a fixed wireless broadband provider for remote rural communities across Cornwall. But in recent years they’ve branched out to focus more on deploying full fibre networks instead of wireless ones.

However, much of the equipment supporting their original FWA network is now said to be “approaching the end of its operational life“, which means it’s becoming “increasingly prone to failure” and is “no longer economically viable to maintain or upgrade“.

Suffice to say that Wildanet have now taken the decision to retire their FWA network and has already begun a project to assist affected customers with transitioning across to an alternative service, in advance of the planned decommissioning. Many of the affected customers have already transitioned over to a new service.

The original timeline to decommission parts of the FWA network was scheduled for June 2025, but this has now been postponed to 31st October 2025 in order to allow more time to transition their remaining customers on to alternative broadband solutions.

Simon Hughes, Chief Commercial Officer at Wildanet, said:

“While the FWA service was an important part of the foundation and early development of Wildanet, some of the supporting infrastructure is no longer economically viable to maintain or upgrade and as a result we have made the difficult decision to retire parts of this older network and focus our efforts on delivering new, more reliable broadband technology.

The Wildanet team will be contacting all remaining customers affected by this change to assist their transition to an alternative broadband service (where they have not already).

Where possible, our teams will help customers move over to an alternative broadband service provided by Wildanet. If that is not currently available at their address, the Wildanet team will assist customers in exploring other options.”

Hopefully this transition won’t result in too many of their remaining FWA subscribers being thrown back to even slower copper-based broadband lines. But we can imagine that this may still be the outcome for some locations.

Original article Total Telecom:Read More

APFN is to provide business-grade FTTP connections to Onecom customers, after a deal was signed between the two companies.

Onecom has already started onboarding to APFN’s aquila platform, through which Onecom will have access to the largest network of business-grade fibre premises in the UK. aquila will enable Onecom to access CityFibre FTTP connectivity for the first time, allowing the reseller immediately to broaden its offer.

Onecom is the UK’s leading provider of business communications, IT, and security services trusted by small to medium-sized organisations and enterprises nationwide.

One of Onecom’s critical business requirements is for Layer 3 connectivity, which aquila can deliver with ease. The Onecom – APFN deal will therefore be the first time that Layer 3 Connectivity is delivered by APFN over the CityFibre network.

Commenting on the deal, Nisreen El-kaloush, APFN Chief Commercial Officer, said, “Our agreement with Onecom is just the latest in a series of deals that we are signing to bring new partners on to aquila. We can’t wait to welcome Onecom on to the platform, and to start delivering amazing service experiences to their customers.”

Marcus Alves, Head of Product and Supplier Management at Onecom, said: “By partnering with All Points Fibre Networks, Onecom is able to offer more businesses the opportunity to access high-performance fibre broadband. This collaboration will ensure that we can meet the growing demand for reliable connectivity, even in areas where traditional providers may not have the capacity to deliver.”

Onecom is committed to helping businesses stay competitive in an ever-evolving digital world. The partnership with APFN strengthens the ability to offer future-proof connectivity, allowing businesses to operate more efficiently, increase productivity, and maintain a strong digital presence.

This partnership opens up new opportunities for businesses across the UK, providing them with the reliable, high-speed fibre connectivity needed to drive efficiency, support growth, and stay competitive.

George Wareing, Chief Sales Officer at CityFibre, said: “AllPoints Fibre Network’s new aquila platform is opening up opportunities for even more partners to reach customers with the best products, the best economics and the best service, all from CityFibre’s  growing full fibre network.”