BT knocks back £8bn local loop bid

NEWS The protracted and sorry tale of BT's unbundling of the local loop has taken a further twist as the UK incumbent has turned down an offer of £8bn for its local loop infrastructure. A consortium of US finance groups lead by Babcock & Brown and Chancery Lane Capital, called Earth Lease, tabled the bid but BT broke off in the preliminary talks as the telco believed its suitors had little chance of tendering a successful bid. Earth Lease claims the backing of a number of major US banks such as JP Morgan Chase. The news will come as a further blow to consumers awaiting a 'broadband Britain' as the consortium had promised to invest £500m in rolling out high-speed internet access across the country. Earth Lease had hoped to buy the final mile of copper wires connecting customers to BT's local exchanges. If successful in its bid, the consortium had planned to open up the local loop to other telecoms providers who could then have begun the installation of ADSL infrastructure. BT has so far been reluctant to share access to its local loop and the process of gaining access has proven a major obstacle for a number of telcos who have gone to the wall during their protracted attempts to offer high-speed internet in the UK.