UK awards five new rural broadband contracts to CityFibre
LONDON: Britain has awarded five contracts to CityFibre and one to Connexin to roll out fibre broadband to 236,000 rural homes and businesses, taking public investment in connecting hard-to-reach areas to more than 1 billion pounds ($1.26 billion).
CityFibre will build in areas in the south-east, while Connexin, which is based in Hull, north-east England, will build in the East Midlands, the government said, adding that the contracts were worth more than 450 million pounds in total.
Britain launched its “Project Gigabit” scheme in 2021 to support fibre broadband in rural areas where commercial networks from BT, Virgin Media and others would not be viable.