Thousands of rural homes and businesses in Northern England and Northern Ireland now have access to hyperfast full fibre broadband connectivity thanks to a multi-million-pound collaboration between Fibrus and ACOME Group.
The use of ACOME Group’s cabling solutions has helped Fibrus speed up its fibre installations to reach 354,000 premises passed across rural and regional areas of Cumbria and Northern Ireland. The connected properties can access broadband speeds of up to 2Gbps.
Fibrus has access to a future-proofed network, decreased Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) and a reduced carbon footprint.
“We are delighted to help Fibrus deliver ultra-fast reliable connectivity to those residents and businesses in Cumbria and Northern Ireland,” said Andrea Garcia, ACOME Group UK Director. “Our 60-fibre cabling has saved installation times, provided technical innovation and delivered increased flexibility. As the cable is also PIA-approved, Fibrus has been able to use existing poles and ducts in the areas, with no need to dig or put up new ones.”
To speed up its fibre rollout, Fibrus sought a cable with more fibre than the standard 48-fibre cables available on the market. ACOME Group worked with Fibrus to co-develop a 60-fibre cable, with a 12-fibre modularity, a structure that mirrors the architecture of the existing fibre infrastructure across the UK.
With a production capacity of 10 million kilometres of optical fibres, the 60 fibre ULW cable was developed in Normandy, France, to be supplied quickly and cost-effectively to Fibrus.
“Since we began working with ACOME Group, our cable supply lead times have reduced and we have kept pace with the high speed of our network delivery and connecting those customers across the UK with dependable connectivity,” said Neil Burrows Fibrus Procurement Director. “Thanks to an efficient installation process, customers in remote towns and villages across Cumbria and Northern Ireland can enjoy faster speeds.”
To further accelerate speed of deployment, Fibrus street cabinets were fitted with an optical distribution solution that was pre-cabled at ACOME’s manufacturing plant in Brittany. The ITOM-V3 optical distribution solution eliminated the need to splice at the cabinet, which meant the risk of project schedules changing and budget not being met were drastically reduced.
Continuing the companies’ collaboration, Fibrus has also begun trialling ACOME Group’s 60-fibre cable constructed with nanomodule technology that reduces the TCO and carbon footprint of deployments.
The rural homes and businesses in Cumbria have been connected thanks to the Project Gigabit broadband scheme supported by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) to deliver lightning-fast broadband connections. Project Stratum is a £197 million pound contract to connect 85,000 hard-to-reach properties across Northern Ireland. Fibrus Networks is also investing in excess of £500m to bring full fibre broadband to homes and businesses in towns, villages across Northern Ireland and Northern England.
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