Full Fibre operator Netomnia (supported by UK ISP YouFibre) has today begun their first two deployments of a new gigabit-capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband network under their latest rollout plan to 2023, which has started in the Welsh town of Wrexham and the city of Bristol in South West England.

The company, which aims to cover 1 million premises by the end of 2023 (so far they’ve done 210,000 – adding around 30,000 per month and rising), is currently being backed by investments worth £418m and their existing deployment already extends across 48 UK towns and cities.

Earlier this month Netomnia revealed their full rollout plan to 2023 (here), although until now we didn’t have much information on when the related builds would start or how far they’d go. The good news is that they’ve already started to build across two of the locations and have been able to share more information.

First up is the market town of Wrexham (soon to become a city) in Wales. The operator plans to invest £12m on their build in this location and will aim to reach 40,000 premises (c. £300 per premises passed), which is being supported by civil engineering contractor GForce. The work looks set to complement their other builds in Wales, including for 29,000 premises in Barry and 55,000 premises in Bridgend.

In addition, Netomnia are investing £47.7m to cover the city of Bristol in the South West, which is expected to cover a total of 159,000 premises in its “initial phase“. The first work has already begun in the suburb of Downend, but the neighbouring communities of Kingswood and Filton will follow in the coming weeks. All of this is being supporting by civil engineering partner Future Networks.

As usual, both locations will see the operator go head-to-head with some gigabit-capable broadband rivals (e.g. Openreach, Virgin Media etc.). But Netomia has so far proven themselves to be quite adept at undercutting rivals on price, while also being incredibly quick to go live in the areas they do pass.

The service itself will be supplied to consumers via ISP YouFibre, which offers unlimited usage, symmetrical speeds, a Wi-Fi router, free installation and 24/7 UK based support. Customers pay from just £22 per month on an 18-month term for their unlimited 50Mbps package, which rises to £45 if you want their top 900Mbps plan (£50 thereafter).

Maybe need to finish what started? In Wisbech, Cambs they promised last December, then March, then end of July. Now October….

just excuses. Cables already in poles since February.

I agree, i’m 13 months on after placing an order, with all other estates round me have it in, but mine is “still in planning”. I gave up and moved on i’m still using 4G (smarty) with an external antenna and pfSense router, averaging 250mbits for £15pm, will do me for now.

Virgin Media are almost finished in my estate, but at £30 for 100mbits, and £62 for 1gig, i’ll pass.

I’m in an “in build” phase area right now. I rang them up and they said 6 months.

Different teams operate in different towns. Gforce working in Wales does not affect their build in the East of England, which is done by other companies

Indeed. Having spent the money getting the CBTs on poles they’re just making excuses rather than finishing the job and recouping some of the investment.

That was sarcasm. There’s clearly some issue preventing it being brought live. There might be cable on the pole but no light to the pole due to other issues outside of their control. Netomnia build rapidly where they can to get a lead on others. That’s part of the business model.

Sounds like your estate is on hold due likely to cost, Andy.

In their defence…. there might be fibre on the pole but it might not be connected back to the spine yet.

All builders generally have issues like this. From watching builders around me – They’ll blitz around getting the area ready and then hit a snag (blocked spine ducting, or damage, or some other issue) – this takes a longer time to clear as its normally not done by the deployment team. The dep team move on and carry on doing their thing. Spine is fixed, deployment team come back.

It’s all about carrying momentum / dealing with the quick wins and stacking blocking issues to be left to teams more experienced. e.g. BT do this locally to me, using Telent to do the pole installs / work or pulls in ducting. Then OR engineers do the spine work which usually involves closing the road, and doing work in covers which are in the road (annoying) or clearing collapsed ducting because of the ageing infrastructure here. (lots of alu phone lines, estates where cables were buried without ducting, etc)

“The operator plans to invest £12m on their build in this location and will aim to reach 40,000 premises (c. £300 per premises passed),”

How are they managing to build out as cheap, or cheaper, than Openreach? Are they utilising PIA to keep their initial build costs to a minimum?

Pretty much everybody is using PIA – this is now normal, although some are spending more on their own trenching and poles than others.

Lots of PIA and a strong focus on efficiency and cost control. No use of cabinets, everything goes underground or on poles.

Most of the excavation is chambers next to existing Openreach chambers and unblocking Openreach ducts and pole bends. A very limited amount of poles but it’s a far lighter build than CF, VM, Gigaclear, etc.

Even the PIA work shows differences in design philosophy. CF are using at least twice as much subduct to pass a group of properties Netomnia have live already.

Can they finish Frome first :)… Still not live after some considerable building going on for months….

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