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Rural broadband ISP Quickline has today confirmed that they’ve reached an agreement with the Government’s Project Gigabit broadband roll-out programme. The deal will see them expand their full fibre (FTTP) network to cover an additional 6,000 hard-to-reach homes and businesses across Yorkshire and Lincolnshire in England.
Until today Quickline had already secured several deployment contracts for the West Yorkshire and the York area (Lot 8), North Yorkshire (Lot 31) and East Riding of Yorkshire and Lincolnshire (Lot 23) under the Project Gigabit scheme (here, here and here). This reflected a total public investment of c.£296.4m to help expand their Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) network into disadvantaged areas.
NOTE: Quickline is supported by funding of c.£500m from Northleaf Capital Partners, as well as over £300m of public subsidy from four Project Gigabit contracts, plus c.£225m in term loans and debt guarantees from the UK Infrastructure Bank (UKIB) and a £25m term loan from NatWest.
However, last week ISPreview revealed that Project Gigabit had modified Quickline’s contract for Lot 31 (here), which increased the contract value (state aid) by £7,988,520 to total £81,457,520 from the original value of £73,469,000. The awarded premises also increased by 6,401 to a total of 42,701 from the original 36,300 planned to be built.
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Quickline has today confirmed that this is part of a wider expansion, which will see the overall level of public investment rise by £11m in order to help them reach an additional 6,000 premises in remote rural areas. The newly added premises are spread across all of their existing Project Gigabit network (not only Lot 31), including in Lot 8 and Lot 23.
Dan Hague, Project Delivery Director for Quickline, said:
“This is great news for people in underserved areas across Yorkshire and Lincolnshire. By refining our plans with the more recent data, we can extend our reach and connect even more homes and businesses to full fibre broadband where it’s needed most. As a trusted regional delivery partner for the UK government, we’re proud to play a key role in ensuring no community is left behind.”
Telecoms Minister, Sir Chris Bryant, said:
“Project Gigabit is boosting some of the most remote areas in the UK and equipping people with the vital tools they need to thrive in the digital world, no matter where they choose to call home.
It is great that even more homes and businesses across Yorkshire and East Riding of Yorkshire and Lincolnshire will soon benefit from the fastest speeds on the market thanks to this government intervention.”
With this expansion, the total public investment in Quickline’s full fibre rollout now exceeds £300m, covering more than 170,000 premises (rising to 360,000+ when you include their plans for associated commercial builds).