Fixed broadband connections continue to increase

Fixed broadband connections continue to increase

The number of households and business premises connected to fixed-line broadband is continuing to rise, new figures from the industry regulator Ofcom have revealed.

In the three months to the end of March, a total of 22.8 million residential and small businesses were connected via fixed-line services, up from 22.6 million at the end of 2013.

On an annual basis, the UK added around one million fixed lines, the Telecommunications Market Data Update said.

The number of people opting for superfast broadband services was also up, with 2.7 million users in the first three months of this year, compared to 2.4 million subscribers in the three months to December 2013.

There was also a rise in the number of cable broadband subscribers, with the figure jumping by around 40,000 in the same period. However, the report showed the biggest growth was in subscribers opting for fibre connections, with a further 357,000 made in the first quarter of the year.

Almost 12 per cent of UK homes and businesses now have what is classed as ‘other’ connections, the majority of which are fibre. The percentage has almost doubled from 6.3 per cent in the same period a year ago.

The report, which looks at the state of the telephony market as a whole in addition to monitoring broadband trends, also showed that mobile phone usage dipped in the first quarter of 2014 compared to the same period in 2013. Outgoing calls from mobile phones were down by 2.5 per cent, while text message numbers dropped by almost 14 per cent.

There was also a 1.5 per cent slump in the number of active dedicated mobile broadband subscriptions to stand at 4.9 million, Telecom Paper reported.

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