Business ISPs who rely on selling internet access alone are not in a good position to tap in to future growth, warns Andrew Saunders, Head of Product Management and Marketing at Zen Internet.
While many have realised that growth is more likely to be enjoyed in selling services down the lines they provide rather than relying [...]

A host of internet service providers are upping their top speeds to 20Mbit/s. ISPs Orange, Plusnet and Zen Internet have all announced they’re raising their respective bars over the past few days. In doing so, they’re making up ground on the likes of Virgin Media, BT, BE and O2, which all already offer “up to” 20Mbit/s services.

Getting a deal to put Sky Player on its IP Vision’s Fetch TV set top box is a coup which its Business and Marketing Director, Peter Cox, believes will show it is doing what Canvas is talking about, only right here and now. In essence, he jokes, it is like having a canvas, only theirs [...]

In a second submission to the BBC Trust Sky has again accused the publicly funded broadcaster of “riding a coach and horses” through the embryonic market for online television.
In another  stinging attack on Project Canvas, published this evening, the satellite broadcaster and ISP accuses the BBC of misspending licence fee money to “stifle innovation” in [...]

BT has announced the roll out of its (up to 100Mb) fibre to the home (FTTH) network will reach twice as many homes as previously estimated.
BT Openreach, which is overseeing the fibre roll out, estimated last year that 1m households would have access to the fibre to the home (FTTH) network by 2012. It now [...]

The UK’s biggest residential ISP has just posted it’s first trading statement since it acquired its former rival Tiscali. And despite its newest brand losing over sixty thousand customers in period in question, the TalkTalk Group has declared a “stronger than expected quarter for customer growth.” However, its forecast for mobile broadband isn’t so positive.

Mobile phone operator O2’s just announced it’s going to start trialling what’s being billed as a 4G network – and it could reach speeds of 340 Mbit/s. Meanwhile, BT’s revealed its first fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) at a UK “brownfield” site. Both are slated to begin next year.

Sky has broken ranks with leading rival ISPs BT and TalkTalk by revealing it thinks disconnection should not be excluded as a possible answer to piracy.
On the day the Government’s consultation on illegal file sharing closed, Sky supported the general direction the Government is taking and emphasised that it, unlike rivals, has an ability to [...]

After BT made the claim that getting tough on Internet piracy would cost around £1 million per day, the body representing the music industry has launched a counter-offensive. BPI boss Geoff Taylor says broadband companies have seen their revenues rising while those of the record business have gone the opposite way because of piracy – and that the ISP’s stance is “just about protecting profits.”

BT has officially announced it’s doubling its so-called “next generation” capabilities – so that it could reach up to seventy-five per cent of UK homes and businesses. But before you get excited with fibre optic dreams, it’s actually talking about ADSL2+.

BT says that clamping down on Internet piracy could cost as much as £1 million per day – and that the consumer is going to have to pick up the bill in the end. John Petter, the firm’s consumer division boss, is warning of a future “arms race” between those who pirate and those who try and police them. Meanwhile, BT is expected to make an announcement about extending its ADSL2+ infrastructure.

By its own figures, released today, Phorm would appear to have a year left to either convince a major ISP to roll out its controversial personalised advertising service or re-invent itself as a content recommendation service for publishers.
Figures for the first half of 2009 show the company lost $15m and now has just over $30m [...]

O2 has announced it’s going into partnership with BT to set up its first fixed-line service for businesses. Meanwhile, BT itself has finally been shown to the green light to put together its own telecoms bundles that include a fixed-line component.

BT is trialling technology it claims can deliver a stable 1Mb service over a 12km line. This, it claims, more than doubles the capabilities of copper which normally cannot support broadband on a line more than 5km from an exchange.
The Broadband Enabling Technology (BET) has already provided a stable 1Mb service to homes 12km away [...]

BT, TalkTalk and Orange have taken the unprecedented step of joining forces with consumer groups to urge the government to ditch Lord Mandelson’s plans to cut off suspected illegal downloaders.
Mandelson’s disconnection plans were revealed last month and are in stark contrast to a more placatory approach outlined in Lord Carter’s earlier Digital Britain report. It [...]

BT’s announced it’s finally rolling out its Wholesale Broadband Managed Connect (WBMC) over IPstream Connect and – while the name alone may a technophobe’s worst nightmare – the move promises to be good news for mainstream broadband users. As part of BT’s plans for its 21st Century Network, it could now be easier and cheaper for ISPs relying on BT Wholesale to speed up their services for end users.

According to the BBC’s IPTV Programme Director, Project Canvas could have an innovative way of storing content locally in order to reduce the bandwidth demands of the service. Not only that, Richard Halton says there’s a “real opportunity” that the much-hyped Project Canvas will reach the market next year. Meanwhile, there’s news on Hulu and Arqiva’s own video-on-demand (VOD) plans.

TalkTalk is to complain to the Advertising Standards Authority tomorrow that BT’s latest ‘up to 20Mb’ advert is ‘misleading’ and based on poor research.
The crucial point is the advert claims BT’s broadband service is ‘consistently faster even at peak times compared with the industry average’.
TalkTalk claims its investigations reveal just 20 lines were tested, over [...]

The lack of legal transparency when it comes to the wireless sharing of Internet access is restricting digital inclusion, according to the author of a new report. Mac Síthigh, who’s just published his academic study “Law in the Last Mile: Sharing Internet Access Through Wi-Fi,” says that’s playing into the hands of business – the ISPs – rather than the citizens of the future Digital Britain.

The Digital Britain team has rejected any suggestion that the 50p copper phone line is to be dropped.
In the face of the Government seemingly cooling on the idea, the Digital Britain team recommitted itself to a 2010 deadline for the 50p levy to become established (digitalbritainforum.org.uk).
The move follows much debate within politics and new [...]