BT has announced that it has held successful trials of "FTTP on demand" in St Agnes, Cornwall, paving the way for broadband download speeds of up to 300Mbps.
Back in 2009 BT announced that it would use "fibre to the cabinet", or FTTC, tech at 29 exchanges across the UK, promising speeds of up to 40Mbps. FTTP tech takes the fibre-optic revolution a step further though by taking advantage of the fibre it has already deployed between the exchanges and the street cabinets to provide super fast speeds both for downloads and uploads.
BT states that this technological development "has the potential to transform the UK broadband landscape". It plans to conduct further trials in the Summer and plans to release the service commercially by spring next year.
Openreach chief executive Olivia Garfield said: "FTTP on demand is a significant development for Broadband Britain. Essentially, it could make our fastest speeds available wherever we deploy fibre. This will be welcome news for small businesses who may wish to benefit from the competitive advantage that such speeds provide.
BT also announced that it expects to begin doubling broadband speeds from 40Mbps to 80Mbps in the next few months and that two thirds of BT's customers will be able to benefit from these faster speeds by the end of 2014.
A recent Ofcom report stated that the average broadband speeds in the UK had risen by 22 per cent since the end of 2010 but that the speed nationally was measured at just 7.6Mbps. 300Mbps still seems a long way away then.....
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