BRADFORD has been named among 29 new locations to benefit from some of the fastest, most reliable broadband services in the country through Openreach's nationwide investment programme.

Work to build new future-proof Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) technology, where fibre is laid all the way from the exchange to people’s front doors, is set to get underway by the end of next year, once engineers have carried out detailed planning and survey work.

Full fibre or ultrafast broadband provides more reliable, resilient and future-proof connectivity; fewer faults; more predictable, consistent speeds and the ability to upgrade easily to meet the demands of future technology.

The upgrades will complement the ongoing broadband upgrades by the Superfast West Yorkshire and York programme, a partnership between the five West Yorkshire local authorities, York City Council, the West Yorkshire Combined Authority, UK Government and Openreach.

Kim Mears, Openreach’s managing director for Strategic Infrastructure Development, said: “We’re looking forward to bringing future proof broadband infrastructure to thousands of homes and businesses across Bradford. Our engineers are about to begin a detailed survey of the city and we plan to start building the network in around a years’ time. Our intention is to build quickly, efficiently and with minimal disruption to people living and working in Bradford.”

The new network in Bradford will benefit both residents and businesses as the technology gives users the ability to use and manage multiple bandwidth-hungry devices at the same.

Businesses can also benefit from cloud-based services, making efficiency improvements and cost savings through improved online sales and marketing and better online ordering and invoicing systems.

Openreach’s commitment to Yorkshire and the Humber extends far beyond making better broadband available. Around 2,300 Openreach people live and work in the region, and since the end of last year the firm has recruited more than 175 new fibre apprentice engineers.

In March 2018 Openreach opened a new £1 million training centre in Bradford to educate the next generation of digital engineers bringing vital broadband services to communities across Yorkshire and beyond. More than 5,000 engineers and new recruits were trained in the first year.

Overall, 103 locations across the UK are now part of the ‘Fibre First’ build programme, including Leeds, Sheffield, Doncaster and now Bradford and as a result, more than 1.8 million homes and businesses now have access to faster, more reliable and future-proof, full fibre broadband services over the Openreach network.