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[Bowdon]

https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2018/07/bt-fttp-broadband-covers-631k-uk-premises-and-g-fast-1-12m.html

BT has published their latest results to the end of June (Q1 2018/19 financial), which report that the coverage of Openreach’s “ultrafast broadband” (100Mbps+ via FTTP and G.fast) network has reached 1.7 million UK premises. But sadly they’ve begun hiding their retail ISP customer figures.

Since the last set of financial results there have been a number of developments for BT. Firstly, they announced a new range of converged fixed line broadband and mobile products, which partly relates to their goal of delivering a “single integrated all-IP fibre network” that will enable seamless converged access across fixed, WiFi and mobile services.

On top of that they’ve announced the departure of CEO Gavin Patterson and recently passed Ofcom’s first test of Openreach’s progress toward independence. But they’ve also been fined £77k for unlawfully sending 4,930,141 spam emails, have hit consumers with yet another price hike, announced the next batch of UK areas to receive G.fast broadband technology and cut wholesale FTTx prices.

However one of the most frustrating changes this quarter is the decision by BT to hide the customer figures for their retail broadband base, which is no doubt partly due to the previous quarterly decline of -3,000 (unlikely to be helped by the recent price hike). ISPs that suffer a subscriber decline tend to stop reporting related figures, until they improve.

Otherwise BT are no doubt busy digesting what Ofcom and the Government’s new full fibre broadband strategy will mean for their position in the market.

    Gavin Patterson, Outgoing CEO of BT Group, said:

    “We’ve made a good start to the year. We are making positive progress against our strategy. Our customer experience metrics continue to improve and we have seen the successful launch of new converged products including BT Plus, our first Consumer converged offering and 4G Assure, for business customers. Initiatives to transform our operating model have seen a gross reduction in c.900 roles across the Group and improved cost performance.

    EE continues to maintain its network leadership and will switch on the UK’s first live 5G network trial in October. Openreach continues its FTTP network deployment and is currently building to c.10,000 premises per week. New Openreach wholesale pricing will incentivise communications providers to encourage more of their customers onto better services and ultimately move the vast majority of Britain’s homes and businesses onto superfast and ultrafast platforms. We welcome the initial outcome of DCMS’ Future Telecoms Infrastructure Review and Ofcom’s approach to future regulation and look forward to further engagement with all our key stakeholders to ensure greater clarity, certainty and support as we look to realise our broader investment ambitions.

    Our outlook for the year remains unchanged.”