Thousands of West Sussex homes to get full-fibre broadband

Openreach is rolling out cables to more rural areas of the county

Author: Ryan Burrows and Alan Jones, PAPublished 28th May 2024

Openreach has announced plans to build full fibre broadband in over 500 more locations across the UK, covering a further 2.7 million homes and businesses - including nearly 30,000 more in West Sussex

The new locations include 400,000 premises in the hardest to reach, most rural parts of the country, including Littlehampton, Rustington, Sharpthorne, Steyning and Danehill.

The work is part of Openreach's £15 billion project to upgrade the UK's broadband infrastructure, making gigabit-capable technology available to 25 million homes and businesses by the end of 2026, including 6.2 million in rural areas.

Clive Selley, chief executive of Openreach, said:

"We're on track and on-budget to make this life-changing broadband technology available to 25 million homes and businesses.

"We plan to build right across the UK, from cities and towns to far-flung farms and island communities.

"Ultimately, we'll reach as many as 30 million premises by the end of the decade if there's a supportive political and regulatory environment.

"Over time, we've learnt to deliver predictably, consistently and at a rapid pace - despite this being a hugely complex national engineering project.

"That gives us confidence to be even clearer about our build plans and we want to be as transparent as possible about where and when we're building.

"Today we're publishing more detail than ever about the places we're building in now, and the communities we'll be upgrading next."

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