By Jo Best, 26 September 2005 00:05
NEWS Broadband speeds are set to reach new highs with the launch of two new super-fast products.
Telewest has announced that it will be boosting the speed of its blueyonder elite broadband package to up to 10Mbps for customers in some parts of Scotland.
Telewest will also be raising speeds for customers in Castlecary, Dumbarton, Motherwell and Uddingston, with 40,000 customers north of the border expected to get more bandwidth.
The cable firm also has bandwidth boosting plans for the capital, with an additional 100,000 customers in London getting higher speeds from the end of this month. The company expects to have all Scottish subscribers upgraded by the end of the year.
Telewest won't be charging its subscribers any extra, the company said.
While Scottish users can now expect some 10Mbps, one ISP is touting an even higher speed for UK users.
ISP Be announced this morning the unveiling of its first commercial offering at that speed. The company had been trialling the up-to-24Mbps DSL-based service earlier this year in London.
The up-to-24Mbps service is available for £24 per month, with the first customer using the service experiencing a speed of around 18.5Mbps - a UK record, Be claims.
Ian Fogg, analyst at JupiterResearch, said the recent stellar increases in broadband speeds are being done to benefit ISPs rather than bandwidth-hungry end users.
He said: "The reason these companies are launching high-speed broadband is firstly because they can - the technology has enabled it. Secondly, it's harder for ISPs to differentiate on price so when they have an opportunity to differentiate themselves with speed products, it's great.
"This is supply side driven, not really customer driven."
Comments
There are 7 comments. Join the discussion
1. dave
Not consumer driven? You think we are all saying politely "no thanks, we are fine with what we got?" I'm gasping for bandwith. Some people may be just checking their emails but others use the net far more. Japan's ISPs offer 5 times telewests top speed. There's a whole world of things to do with this bandwith. Also only this year did Broadband become more widespread than dialup modem, faster speeds are more in demand. We are so far behind other countries like Japan, even euorpean countries get more than us like Poland.
Please don't report that it is not 'consumer driven' because it is mostly. Telewest wants to streamline it's tv/net together and hence the upgrade, however it is also doing it to stop people jumping from them to other upstarters like Bulldog and Be. The trend for people to hop onto the better deal is increasing as the market is slow to react to competitors. Technology is always about bigger, better and faster. This industry is not like Gas and Electric where you pick and company and stick for life.
2. anonymous
Ian Foggs the Jupiter analyst's comment implying that super fast bandwidth is not really in demand by end users totally ignores significant numbers of highly influential early adopters like myself.
I support and have advised many friends family and colleagues what isp/package to select for their home or business. I would take faster bandwidth over a lower price everytime
I am sure many would concur
3. David Talbot
All well and good for the city dwellers but here we go again creating a whole new urban-rural digital divide!
4. Simon
It might be heresy to defend BT on this, but they are in a tricky spot here !
On the one hand they are EXPECTED to provide universal access and are strongly criticised if they don't give it.
On the other hand we have other companies cherry picking the profitable areas and leaving the rest to BT.
Much as it might cause short term pain, it's long overdue that Ofcom start imposing some universal service obligations of the other players. Perhaps we should start pairing profitable and non-profitable areas and make it a condition of serving the profitable areas that the provider also service a corresponding non-profitable area.
If we don't then the likes of BT will find it harder and harder to fund the expensive provision of services to rural areas, whilst others are busy picking the densly populated urban areas.
5. Steve Berry
Digital divide - Maybe not.
What ISPs are really scared of ( in much the same way that BT are scared of VOIP services such as SkyPE ) is mesh networks, which effectively can take ISPs out of the equation. Maybe years off, but any ISP worth their salt know it's coming.
Where ISPs can't or won't commit to, for example, urban rural areas - mesh can play a part.
ISPs will continue to *battle* for customer base, but ultimately the consumer will decide.
The "digital divide" isn't necesarilly about how fast your Net connection is - it's primarily about not having any access to resources at all. Surely that must be the priority.
6. Peter Wright
All BT Broadband packages (and many services from other ISPs) are capped therefore higher speeds mean you get to the cap quicker?
7. anonymous
Fast download speeds are not going to make very much difference to your basic web and mail users. The only real advantage is for P2P users and that traffic is typically throttled anyway. it is also worth checking out the upstream speeds that go with these "fantastic" new dowload promises. If your upstream is slow your download will be too.