North West
intouch Autumn 2013
Our half- year
financial results
highlighted the
fact that our fibre
network now passes
more than 17million
premises, with
more than 2million homes and
businesses using our fibre based
services.
Also noted alongside the commercial rollout
was the great progress with our BDUK
partnerships - you can read about some
of these and case studies of how SMEs are
reaping the rewards of fibre technology in
this issue. The success of BT Sport was also
highlighted, which is not only good news for
sports fans but also has the benefit of driving
broadband take up which can only have a
positive impact across the region.
You may also be aware that Ofcom has
just released their latest UK Infrastructure
Report. This report provides a very
comprehensive review of actual UK
communication infrastructure as of today.
It highlights the strong position of the UK
compared to major EU countries, and the US
in particular, against the key government
targets of SFBB coverage, take up and
overall speed. The report also highlights that
most of the growth in coverage is a result
of BT’s continued investment in fibre and
recognise that the BDUK programme will
help to address this going forward.
But it’s not just about broadband - we take
our social responsibilities seriously at every
level of engagement. We are working with
organisations across the UK to help people
overcome the digital divide and providing
the technology and support for initiatives
such as BBC Children in Need.
It’s a very exciting time for us all.
New postcode checker for fibre broadband
The postcode checker – which tells users when
exchanges in their area are due to have fibre
broadband equipment installed – now offers
more precise information about the status of
their own local exchange.
Instead of telling users about all of the
exchanges in their area, the postcode checker
narrows it down to the exchange that serves
them, annotated with the symbol that
applies to the current super-fast status of the
exchange. This gives a much clearer picture of
whether they are likely to be able to receive
fibre services.

New postcode checker for
fibre broadband

Merseyside looks forward to
super-fast future
New research shows fibre
 network boosting local
economy

Small businesses making it
big with fibre broadband

Power of fibre broadband
feature on YouTube

Young people given a
sporting chance

Disabled people still facing
digital divide
Mike Blackburn, Regional Director for the
North West
mike.blackburn@bt.com.
Openreach’s recently launched
new-look super-fast broadband web
page now gives customers a better
idea of when their exchange will be
upgraded.
 Regional Director’s Message
The checker will provide the information
required for 99 per cent of enquiries – the
exceptions being where postcodes straddle a
number of exchange boundaries,
as they do in Shropshire and Wales.
The new web page also features a list of all
internet service providers offering fibrebased broadband services on the Openreach
network, plus a new ‘don’t let your internet
connection hold you back’ video animation.
In addition, it has been made more mobilefriendly, so it can be viewed on phones and
tablets more easily.
The web page now attracts around 200,000
visitors, and delivers around 25,000
clickthroughs to ISP websites every month.
Check it out at www.superfast-openreach.
co.uk
Lancashire village first to
 benefit from county fibre
plan

BT Sport teams up with
Manchester City FC

Cycling supremo swaps fast
lane for superhighway

BT funds for local community
groups
North West
intouch Autumn 2013
Merseyside looks forward to super-fast future
Thanks to a multi-million pound
deal between five Merseyside local
authorities and BT, fibre broadband
could be extended to up to 98 per
cent of the area’s businesses and
homes within the next three years.
Mayor of Liverpool and Chair of Liverpool
City Region Cabinet, Joe Anderson, said: “The
internet is a huge part of everyday life and it
is vital that we do not get left behind if we are
to compete effectively with the rest of the UK.
This investment in infrastructure will make a
big difference to businesses and households
across the City Region.”
Merseyside Connected – a partnership led
by Liverpool City Council that also includes
Knowsley, St Helens, Sefton and Wirral Councils
– builds on our ongoing commercial fibre
deployment across the Liverpool City Region,
and aims to provide a high-speed broadband
network to an additional 43,000 premises.
This means the vast majority of Merseyside
– around 634,000 properties – could have
access to the technology by the end of July
2016.
The three-year project will begin with a period
of planning and surveying, before Openreach
starts work on the ground in summer 2014.
The main technology deployed will be
Fibre to the Cabinet (FTTC), which provides
downstream speeds of up to 80Mbps and
upstream speeds of up to 20Mbps. However,
Fibre to the Premises (FTTP) technology, which
delivers ultra-fast speeds of up to 330Mbps,
may become available on demand throughout
the entire fibre footprint in due course should
local businesses wish to upgrade.
The Merseyside Connected initiative will also
support the council partnership in its aim to
deliver super-fast broadband to small and
medium enterprises, helping to boost the local
economy.
The new network will be open to all
communications providers on an equivalent
basis, meaning firms and households
in Merseyside will benefit from a highly
competitive market. It will also boost the
competitiveness of local businesses, helping
them to find new customers and operate more
efficiently, while opening up a host of new
learning and development opportunities for
home users.
Similar contracts have also just been signed
covering Newcastle; West Yorkshire and
the East Riding of Yorkshire; Derbyshire,
Nottinghamshire and Leicestershire;
Worcestershire; Berkshire and Oxfordshire;
Essex, Milton Keynes and Bedfordshire.
New research shows fibre network boosting local economy
New independent research by
SERIO at Plymouth University and
Buckman Associates shows that the
fibre network in Cornwall is already
providing a major economic boost
to local small and medium-sized
enterprises (SMEs) - making it one of
the best connected areas in Britain
and the best connected rural region
in Europe.
In fact, six out of every 10 (58 per cent) SMEs
surveyed said their business is growing because
of the new technology, whilst more than a
quarter (26 per cent) have either created
or safeguarded jobs as a direct result of the
efficiency and innovation that super-fast
broadband encourages.
Early findings from the study revealed that
after 12 months, 83 per cent of them were
saving time and money thanks to the faster
speeds and innovative services that fibre
broadband enables.
Nigel Ashcroft, Superfast Cornwall programme
director for the Cornwall Development
Company, said: “The economic benefits of the
infrastructure investment will grow over time,
In addition, over a third of businesses
participating in the study (37.5 per cent)
reported that super-fast broadband had
helped their business to generate new sales,
with a quarter (24 per cent) of that group
pointing to new trade overseas.
but we have encouraging early signs that we
are moving in the right direction in Cornwall.
Given the challenging economic conditions
for SMEs, it is great news that businesses are
growing, generating new sales and creating
jobs for the Cornwall economy.”
More than 35,000 local homes and businesses
are already taking advantage of the faster
speeds, including an estimated 4,130 SMEs.
The Superfast Cornwall project is on track
to deliver fibre broadband to 95 per cent
(originally 80 per cent) of the region, as well as
the Isles of Scilly, by the end of 2014. It is also
aiming to boost speeds for the remaining 5 per
cent of premises (about 13,000) by deploying
alternative technologies.
www.superfastcornwall.org
North West
intouch Autumn 2013
Small businesses making it big with fibre broadband
Businesses all over the UK are now
seeing the benefits of upgrading to
fibre broadband. And for small and
medium enterprises (SMEs), faster
speeds have transformed the way
they work and their relationships
with their clients, as two satisfied
customers explain below.
Brian Rees is company chairman of the if
Agency, an integrated creative agency based in
South Manchester that delivers effective online
and offline campaigns for retail, leisure, finance
and other business clients across the country.
“When we set up six years ago, we quickly
embraced ‘first generation’ broadband
with ADSL that ran at 5Mbps downstream
and 800Kbps upstream. This helped but it
wasn’t a full answer. Large files still couldn’t
be transferred efficiently and many chunky
pieces of artwork were biked up and down
motorways, adding risk, time and cost to jobs.
“We understood that we needed better
connections to compete successfully against
nationally-networked agencies, and to work
more effectively with our blue-chip clients.
“Our IT consultant outlined the benefits we
could gain from fibre broadband with a superfast connection. We found that BT was offering
its new BT Infinity services in the region
and responded immediately to its customer
marketing. After two days of installation work
in November 2010, we have never looked
back.
“Using fibre connections, we are more
responsive than ever, and can now zap
45Mbps downstream and about 13Mbps
up. We worried about the cost and possible
inconvenience, but this game-changing
improvement in the service we can offer has
not cost us a premium, and we didn’t suffer
any disruption to our business.
“We understand that our connections are
the platform for our continuing success. We
always keep a close eye on BT’s plans and
developments so we’re best positioned to
take advantage of the latest technologies in
our ever-changing and furiously competitive
business.”
Stuart Landreth is one of the founders and
directors of Northumberland-based BeeBox
Systems, which provides background music
systems and digital signage to bars, clubs,
hotels, restaurants and family entertainment
centres across the North East and, increasingly,
throughout the country.
“The traditional industry model for providing
music services – still widely in use today – is
particularly slow and inflexible. The service
provider receives new material from the
content provider, processes it onto a computer,
burns it to a CD, and then sends it by post to
the venue for the landlord to upload locally. It
takes at least a week to complete the end-toend process when nothing goes wrong.
“Using fibre broadband, we upload new
content to our servers as it arrives from our
providers. Every night, each customer’s system
automatically downloads a scheduled daily
update that includes new releases and any
requests that they have made. If anything goes
wrong or our customer needs a last-minute
change, our fibre connection allows us to fix
the problem remotely, in real time, often while
the customer is still on the phone.
“Super-fast fibre has transformed the range
and quality of services we can offer. We have
two BT Infinity lines with a custom-designed
router that helps to load balance our needs for
fast content turnaround, and are moving away
from desktop-based software to a web-based
and cloud-based management system so that
we can work from anywhere, at any time.
“We no longer experience capacity constraints
that affect our general office systems, so
we use all our time far more effectively.
We automate where we can to add new
services, and to keep our costs low and prices
competitive.”
If your business has received a boost from fibre
broadband, and you would like your story to
be featured as a case study in a future edition
of InTouch, we would love to hear from you.
Please contact regions.comms@bt.com
Power of fibre broadband featured on YouTube
The winning entries in a short story
competition held in Northern Ireland
have been turned into thoughtprovoking films on the power of fibre
broadband and they can now be
found on YouTube.
write a 500-word story illustrating how fibre
broadband can transform people’s lives. Take a
look at these inspiring videos – they really help
bring the story to life.
Northern Ireland Broadband’s ‘Super Short’
competition challenged teenage citizens to
Another inspiring video available on YouTube
has been produced, capturing the great work
Fourteen-year-old Enniskillen student Dorothy
McDowell’s film can be viewed here. Twelveyear-old Lisburn student Amy Warke’s film can
be viewed here.
that is going on in Cornwall via the Get IT
Together programme to help local people take
their first steps to get online.
You can view the video on the Better Future
YouTube channel here.
North West
intouch Autumn 2013
Young people given a sporting chance
An exciting new venture between
BT and its BT Sport partners and
Comic Relief is using the power of
sport to help disadvantaged young
people both here in the UK and
around the world.
The Supporters Club has been set up to raise
money to fund the coaches, mentors and
teachers that these young people need to
help them to fulfil their potential.
When customers sign up to BT Sport
through our call centres, bt.com or www.
thesupportersclub.org, they are being
invited to make a recurring £1, £3 or £5
monthly donation to The Supporters Club,
collected via their BT bills. However, people
who haven’t signed up to BT Sport but wish
to contribute can do so through our website
as well.
BT have donated £500,000 from various
initiatives to kick things off and will match
every £1 given by customers up to the first
£1 million. In addition, we are covering
the running costs of the fund so that 100
percent of donations will go straight to The
Supporters Club, which will be managed by
Comic Relief.
The scheme aims to support initiatives both
in the UK and overseas that utilise the power
of sport to help disadvantaged young people
improve their lives. These include projects
that boost enrolment and achievement in
school; reduce levels of exploitation and
abuse; secure jobs; improve health and
wellbeing; and heighten confidence and
self-esteem. We will be regularly updating
our website and producing TV programmes
featuring projects funded by The Supporters
Club, which will be broadcast on BT Sport.
Business responsibility matters to BT, and
social responsibility is a central part of our
business strategy. The Supporters Club as an
effective way for us to work hand in hand
with our customers and our employees to
make a real difference to disadvantaged
young people.
Already, thousands of customers and BT
employees have signed up to donate to
The Supporters Club, bringing in around
£300,000 a year, which BT will match –
adding a further £300,000 in the pot. To
find out more about the scheme, visit www.
sport.bt.com
Disabled people still facing digital divide
The potential for mainstream
technology to transform the
lives of the 11 million disabled
people in the UK remains largely
untapped, according to research
funded by BT’s Connected Society
programme.
In a new report, disability charity Scope and
the Royal College of Art’s Helen Hamlyn
Centre for Design argue that disabled
people still encounter a huge digital
divide – and that many still have to choose
between expensive specialist equipment
and inaccessible mainstream gadgets.
Researchers from the Helen Hamlyn Centre
for Design discovered that technology
built for disabled people is expensive,
offers low functionality and often requires
specialist knowledge to adapt. Mainstream
technology, like iPads and Windows Tablets,
is cheaper and can do much more, but is
rarely customised to meet disabled people’s
needs.
To coincide with the launch of the report –
entitled Enabling Technology – BT, Scope
and the Helen Hamlyn Centre for Design
unveiled a series of digital technology
prototypes at the London Design Festival in
September. These included:
The research also found that the
information available to disabled people
about enabling technology needs to be
improved. They are amongst the groups
least likely to use the internet, and are
20 per cent less likely to be online than
their peers – despite the huge potential of
services like online shopping and banking
which could transform their lives.
•the ‘Tailored Touch’ mouse, which can be
made from touch-sensitive pads on any
surface, and in any shape or size
With this in mind, the report outlines
a series of recommendations for
technology companies, commissioners
and the providers of key digital services to
maximise the ‘enabling potential’ of digital
technology.
•the ‘Pop-up Reader’, which allows a
blind or partially-sighted person to read
letters and other documents via their
smartphone.
The Enabling Technology report, plus
accompanying videos, can be found at
http://blog.scope.org.uk/2013/09/20/
technology-for-disabled-people
North West
intouch Autumn 2013
Lancashire village first to benefit from county fibre plan
Residents of a picturesque
Lancashire village are celebrating
becoming the first rural community
in the county to benefit from the
multi-million pound Superfast
Lancashire project.
The completion of engineering work means
most of the 240 premises in Belthorn will
now be able to connect to the super-fast
network. Villagers can look forward to
download speeds of up to 80Mbps and
upload speeds of up to 20Mbps, enabling
them to share large files of information,
upload photographs, download music, films
and television programmes, and surf the
internet more quickly than ever before.
UK Insulations Ltd was the first business
in the village to order a fibre broadband
service, and is already seeing the benefits.
Finance director Ian Billing said: “We’re
expanding and have customers around
the world from China to South America.
Having super-fast broadband will help us
to compete with larger businesses, in this
global marketplace, on an equal footing.”
Landlord Nicholas Parker, who runs the
village’s Dog Inn, added: “We offer free
Wi-Fi to customers but with the current
connections the service is a bit hit and miss.
With fibre we plan to offer a wireless hub
for business customers to hold meetings, a
sports hub so fans can watch games on their
hand-held devices, and an entertainment
hub to keep the youngsters occupied
watching a film, playing online games or
using social media - all at the same time.”
Work on the Superfast Lancashire project is
well underway across the county, with a total
of around 17,000 homes and businesses
expected to be connected by the end of this
year. Openreach engineers will be laying
around 2,700km of optical fibre cable and
installing around 700 new fibre broadband
cabinets throughout the project area, with
an estimated million manhours of work
being completed in planning and building
the network.
Superfast Lancashire is a partnership
between BT and Lancashire County
Council, with additional funding from the
Government’s Broadband Delivery UK, as
well as the European Regional Development
Fund, Blackburn with Darwen Council and
Blackpool Council. By the end of 2015,
the project will have brought high-speed
broadband to 97 per cent of Lancashire’s
homes and businesses.
In addition, as part of the Superfast
Lancashire roll-out, a Business Support
Centre run by a team of specialists has
opened to advise small and medium-sized
businesses across the county on how to
use the new technology to enhance their
business.
More information is available at www.
superfastlancashire.com
Celebrations in Belthorn
BT Sport teams up with Manchester City FC
Joe Hart and BT Sport
BT Sport has struck a threeyear deal to become an Official
Partner of Manchester City
Football Club.
the Manchester City TV team regularly
on match days from the renamed BT City
Square – a new fanzone outside the north
end of the Etihad stadium created to give
fans an even better match-day experience
before and after home games.
The service, which features Manchester
City goalkeeper Joe Hart in its
advertisements, will give its viewers access
to exclusive behind-the-scenes content
and interviews. It will also link up with
The partnership will bring fans of
Manchester City even closer to the action,
with weekly interviews from key members
of the playing staff.
North West
intouch Autumn 2013
Cycling supremo swaps fast lane for superhighway
In October, British cycling legend
and Olympic gold medallist Chris
Boardman rode into Superfast
Lancashire’s ‘Get Your Business
Superfast’ event in Preston to
deliver super-fast business advice
to local firms.
Hailing from the North West, and now
an entrepreneur himself, Chris aimed to
inspire delegates with a keynote speech
entitled ‘From dole to Olympic gold, and
building a successful business’.
The free event – organised by Superfast
Lancashire’s Business Support Centre team
– was designed to help small and medium-
sized enterprises make the most of superfast broadband. Around 80 Lancashirebased SMEs attended the session, which
included informal presentations, master
classes and workshops.
Speakers included BT futurologist Nicola
Millard, who provided an insight into what
may lie around the corner for businesses
and their customers. Delegates were also
given advice on topics such as digital
marketing, social media, cloud computing,
better use of the internet and creative
website design.
Superfast Lancashire is a multi-million
pound partnership between Lancashire
County Council and BT, which by the
end of 2015 will have brought highspeed broadband to 97 per cent of
the county’s homes and businesses.
For more information, visit www.
superfastlancashire.com
In addition, specialist advisors from the
Superfast Lancashire Business Support
Centre were on hand to talk about their
free support services.
BT funds for local community groups
The company is rewarding
organisations and community groups
across the North West with grants of
up to £1,000.
The donations are being made through our
employee recognition scheme, the BT People
Awards, which were launched last year. The
scheme acknowledges our volunteering
heroes, who offer their time and skills to help
people in their local community, by awarding
grants to organisations with which they are
involved.
Thirteen groups in the North West have
received grants to enable them to continue
their excellent work in the community,
including: Beetham Church Heritage Trust
in Cumbria, Blacon Youth Football Club in
Chester, 8th Wigan Boys’ Brigade in Wigan
and Unicorn Athletic Junior Football Club in
Altrincham
Mike Blackburn, BT Regional Director,
said: “BT has a long history of working
with good causes to help improve lives. We
see volunteering as a two-way benefit as
there are many development opportunities
when new skills are brought back into the
workplace. Some of these experiences can
only be gained by playing such an active role
in the local community.”
For more information, and a complete list of
the latest award recipients, go to
www.btpeopleawards.co.uk.
To find out more about BT’s wider portfolio of
activities please see our new brochure at
www.bt.com/charityportfolio