BT Wins Northern Ireland Broadband Deal

BT have just won a contract that roll broadband out to the 1.7 million inhabitants of Northern Ireland

Out of the twenty-seven companies who responded to the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment (DETI) invitation to tender, BT had already looked to be the favourite for some time.

Enterprise Minister Ian Pearson said “This will allow all our businesses, even those in the most rural locations, to avail of broadband services to compete in the global market.”

DETI’s objective is to offer every business and household in Northern Ireland at least a 512kbps connection by the end of 2005. This would make the region the first in the UK to offer 100% coverage. Coverage is currently 60%, with takeup of 10%.

BBC News on the deal

The Register

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Fraser Lovatt

Fraser Lovatt has spent the last fifteen years working in publishing, TV and the Internet in various capacities, and believes that they will be seperate platforms for at least a while yet. His main interests at the moment are exploring where Linux is taking home entertainment and how technology is conferring technical skills on more and more people. Fraser Lovatt was born in the same year that 2001: A Space Odyssey was delighting and confusing people in the cinemas, and developed a lifelong love of technology as soon as he realised that things could be taken apart, sometimes put back together again, but mostly left in bits or made into something the original designer hadn't quite planned upon. At school he was definitely in the ZX Spectrum/Magpie/BMX camp, rather than the BBC Micro/Blue Peter/well-behaved group. This is all deeply ironic as he later went on to spend nine years working at the BBC. After a few years of working as a bookseller in Scotland, ("Back when it was actually a skilled profession" he'll tell anyone still listening), he moved to England for reasons he can't quite explain adequately to himself. After a couple of publishing jobs punctuated by sporadic bursts of travelling and photography came the aforementioned nine years at the BBC where he specialised in internet technologies and video. These days his primary interests are Java, Linux, videogames and pies - and if they're not candidates for convergence, then what is?