Broadband ISP Quickline, which is deploying a new gigabit speed full fibre (FTTP) and fixed wireless (5G FWA) network across rural and semi-rural parts of the North East and Midlands of England, has connected their first customer under the £60m (state aid) Project Gigabit roll-out contract that was awarded to them in February 2024 for West Yorkshire and York (Lot 8).
The West Yorkshire and York Area (Lot 8) contract aims to cover around 28,000 premises, in some of the hardest to reach areas, including rural locations surrounding Selby, York, Bradford, Kirklees, Leeds, Wakefield, Harrogate, Skipton and Ripon, Keighley, Calder Valley, Stamford Bridge and Pocklington.
As part of that, Quickline has separately also committed to make a further private investment alongside the Project Gigabit roll-out, which will see their full fibre network reach an additional 58,000 premises. This broadly reflects the usual additionality (i.e. separately expanding coverage out via commercial investment, based on the same geographic areas passed using public investment).
So far only three months have passed since the contract was announced, yet it’s impressive to note today that Quickline has just been able to connect their first homes to the new network in Escrick, near York. Quickline’s CEO, Sean Royce, even visited the customer and handed over a hamper to celebrate the milestone. Escrick is a small rural community to the south of York with around 380 households.
Sean Royce, CEO of Quickline, said:
“Winning the government Project Gigabit contract was a huge honour for us at Quickline but importantly, we want to ensure we make an impact quickly. That means we are building straight away, connecting customers straight away and taking communities out of the slow lane faster than other providers.
As a dedicated rural provider, we know there are thousands of people who have long been underserved by decent broadband and it is imperative this is addressed as soon as possible.
We are delighted to be able to make a difference to the lives of the people living in Escrick just three months after signing the contract and will continue to deliver our network quickly and efficiently to those hard-to-reach communities most in need of improved connectivity.
When you consider there is no mains gas supply to Escrick, it really does emphasise the type of rural communities where we build and that Project Gigabit is tackling.
This milestone underscores Quickline’s absolute commitment to bridging the digital divide and empowering rural communities across Yorkshire and Lincolnshire.”
Quickline is being supported by funding of around £500m from Northleaf Capital Partners and £104m of public subsidy from Project Gigabit (here and here). The provider holds an aspiration to cove around 500,000 premises in rural and semi-rural areas across Northern England and beyond with “ultrafast broadband” via both their Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP / XGS-PON) and 5G based fixed wireless technology “by 2025” (here). Some 200,000 of those rural premises will be tackled by their wireless network, with the other half or more coming from FTTP.
Residential customers reached by their new full fibre network are typically charged from £29 per month on a 24-month term for 100Mbps (50Mbps upload) speeds with free installation, and that goes up to £49 for their top 900Mbps (450Mbps upload) tier. The first 3 months of service are also free.