Are you in an area where the commercial providers have failed to provide superfast broadband?

CSW Broadband is delivering Superfast Broadband (min 24Mbps) across Coventry Solihull and Warwickshire to places where commercial providers won’t offer a service. This is being achieved by rolling out high speed fibre optic cables and equipment, which is available to Internet Service Providers (ISP) to deliver their products, including high speed fibre optic broadband, to you. This allows you to choose the ISP and the products that suit your needs – and your wallet. What we will be buying is known as Next Generation Access (NGA). This refers to the actual broadband network, as opposed to superfast broadband which is one of the services that will be delivered over the network.

Work is already underway in some areas as a result of an initial round of public funding. Further funds have now become available and to secure them and then to expand the scope of the project we need up to date information about broadband that people receive or is available to them if they want it.

We can only use public funding for places which will not receive Superfast Broadband as a result of earlier rollout i.e. installed by a supplier in the normal course of their business, or through the first CSW Broadband project.  Now that we have the funding and are planning the second stage of our rollout. We need to confirm which areas are eligible for our assistance – and this is where we need your help!

A key part of the consultation is our mapping. The State Aid Intervention Map – NGA shows the State Aid intervention area – in other words where we believe we will be legally able to spend public money. PLEASE NOTE: this is not a broadband coverage map!

The map has four different shadings using seven digit postcode resolution:

• Black = where two or more providers have stated that they will be providing NGA services
• Grey = where one provider has stated that they will be providing NGA services
• Hatched = conditional white. This means that a provider has previously said that they would provide coverage but has not done so yet
• White (shaded pink on the map) = Areas that we can invest in and which may be included in the Invitation to Tender

Because the map aims to define the Intervention Area it differs significantly from the Superfast Broadband Availability maps we produce to track the rollout.

Consider a postcode where 89 out of 100 homes or businesses have been connected to the NGA network, on the Intervention Map this would be shown as No provider because there are still 11 homes or businesses to be connected. However, on the Superfast Broadband Availability maps it would be shown as Available with our usual caveat that you must check availability for your own home or business using the commercial provider’s website.

By mapping partial postcodes as white (pink) we retain the option to invest in these areas if intervention is required to ensure availability of superfast broadband.

For the planned rollout under the current CSW Broadband project please refer to our 12-month rolling plan and associated map.

BDUK has introduced very strict criteria as to what qualifies as grey, and we have applied this rigorously so as to minimise the grey areas as far as possible. For NGA, each postcode is turned Grey if:

• BT has upgraded the network infrastructure serving the area AND ALL premises within the postcode have an estimated (VDSL2 for FTTC) Access Line Speed of more than 15Mbps;
• OR, if Virgin Media serve 90% or more of premises within a postcode;
• OR, if it is in an area that is served by an alternative fibre-based, NGA fixed wireless or other qualifying technology that meets the requirements of the BDUK NGA Technology Guidelines.
• Each postcode is turned Black for NGA if it satisfies at least two of these conditions. Postcodes that satisfy one of these conditions is turned grey. All other postcodes remain White.
• Where 2 operators have declared partial coverage of premises within a postcode, a complete overlap of coverage is assumed, e.g. if a postcode contains 30 premises and operator A serves 10 premises and operator B serves 25 premises with Superfast Broadband, 5 premises are considered to be NGA white.
• Even 1 premise under 15Mbps would turn a postcode white, even though 99% may have NGA coverage.

BDUK are being pessimistic about expected coverage and this is reflected in the mapping. Furthermore, we are aggressively enforcing white areas to maximise potential coverage.

The priority for CSW Broadband will be to use the available public funding to provide a ‘step change’ in broadband capability for premises currently getting relatively slow broadband speeds (less than 15Mbps). Therefore, in the first instance, the focus of the forthcoming procurement under the BDUK Framework will be the NGA White areas identified in the State Aid Map below. However, the project reserves the right to consider extending intervention to the areas classified as “Conditional White” in the event that the risks of these premises not achieving Superfast Broadband is verified.

When we go to tender the areas to be covered will be refined by taking some postcodes out of scope and not by turning areas grey. This is obviously better as it allows them to be introduced later if necessary.

We need to be able to identify:

• Any premises that are shaded grey or black on our map that are unable to access broadband with a minimum speed of 24Mbps
• Any premises that are in the proposed intervention area (shaded pink on our map) and are already able to access 24Mbps or above
• Any areas that are shaded pink on our map where there are proposals to provide a minimum 2Mbps service or a superfast broadband service within the next three years.

To do this we need to confirm that the information we have is accurate and up to date. For example we believe that some areas which have been marked as grey or black may not have or will not get superfast speeds – and that is where you come in.

Please respond to this consultation even if you have previously completed one of our surveys as this information forms part of our formal procurement process

What we need you to do?

1)      Look on our map to see how your area has been defined – are we showing you as being in an area that has (or will receive) superfast broadband or not? www.cswbroadband.org.uk/consultation

2)      We need to know if we have the designation for your area correct on the map. Please use the BT Broadband checker (www.dslchecker.bt.com) to find out if superfast broadband is available in your area – in which case it will say that speeds of 24Mbps or above are achievable. To use the checker, either enter a BT landline telephone number (including area code) or your address (you need to click the link below the number box). Please do not use the postcode checker as it is not accurate enough to be of any help!

3)      If you are currently subscribing to a superfast broadband service are you achieving the speeds that you should? Check your speed at www.speedtest.net  and note the results.

4)      If there is/are alternative provider(s) to BT using fibre, wireless or other technology to bring you services please make a note of them.

5)      If, after carrying out the checks above, you believe that we have your area wrongly designated on the map please complete our survey at www.cswbroadband.org.uk/consultation

Please note that this consultation closes on 18th September, so please respond as soon as possible

Thank you for your help – your responses will help us to ensure that we are able to consider those areas that will not otherwise be upgraded

Questions and Answers

Why are you carrying out another public consultation?

The public consultation is not just some random exercise that we have decided to undertake. It is a requirement for the procurement that we plan to undertake in the autumn. We have already carried out an Open Market Review whereby we ask the providers where they expect to provide superfast broadband by 2017. We know from the previous procurement and consultations where the cabinets are. What we are less clear about is which properties are on exchange only lines or have other issues, particularly those in areas that may have been upgraded to superfast as part of the commercial programme or as part of the CSW Broadband rollout.

Once we have good information we can then use it to challenge the responses that we receive to our Invitation to Tender. We do not expect to simply accept what we are given, but in order to provide a robust challenge we do need accurate information. That is why we are asking people to engage in the consultation process.

In summary, we are only at the beginning of a huge rollout. Our ultimate goal is to achieve the 2020 EU targets of 100% connected at 30Mbps or above, and our aim is to do that well before 2020 (funding permitting). We are doing all that we can to take the fibre connectivity to as many premises as possible and some may take a little longer than others. If anyone is unable to wait for the public network to roll out then there are options to privately fund a connection through BT but that will be expensive – and it is that cost that prevents our project from implementing one-off or small-scale solutions at this stage when there will be better and less expensive technologies available in the future.

Can our village contribute financially to the contract to be sure of being included in the next rollout?

The problem remains that we can’t see any mechanism for ensuring that a particular village or parish would be economically covered. We will go out to tender to achieve a minimum percentage coverage. The bidders will come back with their proposals, which will include the percentage that they will achieve. Last time we asked for 90% and the current rollout should achieve 91%. We then enter into all sorts of contract negotiations which include the total homes passed (THP). BDUK have oversight of all projects and so they are able to advise if we are achieving value for money. Last time we were told that we had scored extremely well on all counts when compared to other projects.

As we do not have detailed knowledge of any providers’ existing infrastructure and are not network design engineers we have to let the contractor design the rollout plan so that they make best use of the available funding whilst achieving the project objectives (fibre as far as possible etc) and the THP. Throughout the project there are clear contractual milestones which are monitored and payment is made on the basis of results.

In theory if there was to be fibre in your area but not covering a cabinet then you could pay towards that, but the cost would depend on where the fibre connection was and any difficulties in standing the cabinet, powering it up, connecting it etc. At this stage there are simply too many variables, but we are aware of communities that have approached BT directly for a bespoke solution and been quoted anything from £20-50k.

We will be asking our partners for support to match the additional £6m, but that will be over a much larger area rather than a specific village or parish.

As we don’t know at this stage what the rollout will look like for the £7.36m that we have bid for, or indeed for any part of the £6m that we are hoping to find match for, we would suggest that now is not the best time for you to be thinking about spending your money. We should imagine that you would be less than happy to commit several £00,000s only to find that it could have been included in the project anyway!

Frequently asked general broadband questions can be found on our website at:

http://www.cswbroadband.org.uk/faq

We need to reach as many people as possible as quickly as possible. Please send this email to your contacts and encourage them to send it further. It’s probably best to remove the contact details above our logo at the top of the email otherwise it could get to be a very long string before the email itself appears!

CSW Broadband now on social media – come and join the conversation

We are now on the major social media channels and are already creating a buzz. Join in for up-to-date information and an opportunity to influence how the project develops

Facebook Page –  https://www.facebook.com/CSWSuperfastBroadband

Twitter – https://twitter.com#!/cswbroadband

LinkedIn –  http://www.linkedin.com/groups/CSW-Superfast-Broadband-4403473

Phase one rollout update

Work is progressing well on phase one of the rollout programme. At the time of writing we have a total of 40 cabinets live with a further 15 Phase One cabinets due to go live over the next few months. Phase one is almost a testing phase as we get to grips with the contract management requirements that are laid down by BDUK, and with the numerous other considerations that need to be worked through before a cabinet can be stood and made live.

A major consideration is the siting of the cabinet itself. Whilst there is no longer a requirement for planning permission to be obtained, we do try to be mindful of the locations in which the cabinets are to be placed. However there is sometimes a trade-off as we do have to meet statutory requirements with regard to highways safety considerations such as visibility for drivers, access to pavements and distances from tree roots etc. We also have to consider the safety of the workmen who will be opening the cabinet regularly to make the physical connections as more subscribers come on-stream. There is also, of course, the requirement not only to provide power to the cabinet itself, but also to ensure that we are not impeding other underground services such as gas and water. In some cases avoiding other services can be a real challenge, and not one that is obvious simply by looking at a street-scene to decide on a cabinet location.

The good thing is that during the run-up to phase one and through the early stages of the rollout we have built strong relationships with other agencies and partners, and have worked together to build processes that will help to minimise the time required to survey a location. We are also finding ways to streamline the actual installation and commissioning process so that things will run as smoothly as possible.

Phase two is about to start

Phase two of the project is due to start in July, with a further 41 cabinets being brought into the programme. These are located across Warwickshire, and include a mix of some very rural areas and some that are not so rural. The full list can be seen on the updated rolling 12-month plan, which is available at: http://www.cswbroadband.org.uk/where-when/rolling-12-month-plan

The exchange areas that are to be upgraded from January are now also included in the rolling 12-month plan, and the September update will bring information on further exchanges.

We did say that we would endeavour to accelerate the rollout and we are actually well ahead of the original programme. As we move into the more difficult areas thing may slow down a little, but we are still expecting to complete the current rollout by spring 2016.

Additional funding

As previously mentioned, the CSW Broadband project was offered the opportunity to bid for £3.68m additional BDUK funding to take our coverage up to 95%, subject to match funding being found. We did say that the match would be a difficult ask given the current condition of Local Authority finances, but are delighted to announce that the provision of broadband throughout the area is considered by our elected members to be a high priority for our businesses and communities and so the WCC Cabinet approved the match funding at their June meeting.

We are now working to submit our bid to BDUK by the deadline of 30^th June.

In a welcome turn of events, we have now been offered the opportunity to bid for a further £6m – this is on top of the £3.68m and could make a total of £9.68m additional BDUK money available to the project. When you consider that the current £15.47m contract consists of £4.445m BDUK, £4.445m local authorities and £6.58m from BT it puts the potential additional funding into perspective.

We would need to raise an additional £6m over and above the £3.68m, but if we are able to find the match funding and to procure a delivery partner it could mean a total additional spend of over £19m, plus the delivery partner contribution. That would certainly help to extend the fibre network, although it should be borne in mind that as we extend further out the costs increase so that the number of properties passed will not be at the same ratio as with the current project.

So, where will the additional match funding come from? Well we have just made a submission through the Coventry and Warwickshire Local Enterprise Partnership for just under £8m EU funding to cover the period 2014 to 2020. This should allow us to cover the £6m, and we hope to hear about this towards the end of this year.

Procurement of the additional network capacity

The procurement of a partner to work with us on the delivery of the additional rollout has unofficially started, with the release last week of our Open Market Review. This does not form part of the legal requirements but is considered to be best practice and we did the same thing with the first contract. Under the Open Market Review suppliers are invited to tell us where they intend to extend their networks over the next three years. The information will be submitted in commercial confidence and will be used to develop the “Grey Areas” for the Public Consultation, which is part of the formal procurement process. Readers will recall that our project is not allowed under State Aid rules to operate in the grey areas as publicly funded projects should quite rightly not cut across private enterprise. Therefore we hope for a good level of response to the Open Market Review and Public consultation, as once the grey areas are set they cannot be changed. We assume that any provider who is planning to invest in their infrastructure will wish to respond to the Open Market Review, which can be found here: http://www.cswbroadband.org.uk/whats-happening/procurement-2014/open-market-review-omr

New CSW Broadband email addresses

We are moving to a new CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system which will make it easier to keep track of our contacts as we have over 12,000 records in our current database. We are also taking this opportunity to set up two new email addresses. From the next edition our newsletter will come to you from BroadbandNews@cswbroadband.org.uk. Please ensure that your firewall will accept that address if you wish to continue to receive our newsletters.

We will also be setting up a new address for enquiries and will give information about that in the next newsletter. In the meantime please continue to use broadband@warwickshire.gov.uk for any enquiries

Events on website

We continue to offer a wide range of events through our website. These are delivered by partner organisations and many are completely free of charge. They cover mainly ICT-related topics and we hope to expand the offering.

We will be starting another round of local briefings about the project in September, and information will appear in a future newsletter.

Questions and Answers

My area is still shown as amber, what does that mean?

We don’t have information about the rollout in all areas yet, so they will remain amber. Don’t worry, you are still included in the programme and the timescales have not changed.

So when will I find out if I am included in the rollout under the additional funding?

In realistic terms we are unlikely to be in a position to announce the successful bidder until the New Year and past experience tells us that even then it will be some months before we are able to say which areas will be covered – and of course it all depends on how much funding we actually have!

How far will you get with the additional funding?

An excellent question! The £3.68m BDUK money is to take us to 95%. After that it gets progressively more expensive to provide superfast broadband as communities may be smaller, areas are more sparsely populated and there are geographic and topographic considerations such as rivers. motorways, railways and other obstacles to consider. This doesn’t make it impossible, it just means that the cost per property is considerably higher so that the further we go the less overage we get for the money.

It is less straightforward to say what we would get with the additional £6m (plus £6m match and contractor’s contribution). Although we are working towards our % rollout goals the figures that we use are based on premises that are currently existing. As we all know, there is a huge amount of development that is due to take place across the whole country, and our area is no exception. As things stand at present there is no planning requirement for a developer to provide superfast broadband, and some developments are being built in areas where there is no existing fibre spine. We are therefore working with planners to address this issue and more information will be given in the next newsletter. This development means that we are constantly trying to hit a moving target.

We also have to bear in mind that the further we roll out the more challenging, and therefore the more expensive, the provision of fibre broadband becomes. Extensive work is therefore being undertaken to more fully understand the challenges and the potential costs.

At the end of the day, until we go through procurement we will not know exactly what is achievable, but we are doing our utmost to ensure that we have all of the necessary information to once again be able to provide a robust challenge throughout the procurement exercise.

Frequently asked general broadband questions can be found on our website at:

http://www.cswbroadband.org.uk/faq

Review of the year

As we approach the end of the year this is a good time to reflect back on all that has happened over the past 12 months, so here is a quick round-up:

January

After a lot of work on the part of the project team, including an extensive Open Market Review to understand what the commercial providers’ plans were, the project entered the procurement phase and the Invitation to Tender was issued. The website was also restructured to reflect the new stage of the project.

February

Call for final locations of cabinets so that we could challenge the information that we were receiving from bidders. Detailed maps published showing the information that we held right down to individual property level. This was dependent on the cabinets being in the locations where we thought they were!

March

Responding to queries from potential bidders and preparing for tender evaluation.

April

Tenders returns received and evaluation commenced. The information from Champions and from survey returns was extremely useful in helping us to test the information that we were given in the tender documentation. This was particularly helpful in challenging the distance of properties from the actual locations of the cabinets – and therefore the speeds that are likely to be achievable.

May

Evaluation and challenge of tender return documents continued. Champions map went live on the website showing where the champions are located and survey returns. Businesses were invited to register as potential sub-contract suppliers to the project. We started to hold consultation events in each area. 10,000^th survey response received – the sender of that survey won £20 in Amazon vouchers.

June

Contract with BT announced.  £14.57m project to achieve 91% fibre coverage by spring 2016. Additional 40,000 premises to achieve superfast speeds over and above the commercial broadband rollout. Launch event held at the Lord Leycester Hospital in Warwick and mini launch events continued in the five Warwickshire Districts. We started the project initiation activities, including the start of the modelling work for the additional £750 public funding that we attracted to the project through the procurement process

July

Website upgraded to show the current status of the project now that contracts were signed. The CSW Broadband team visited the BT Network Academy to learn about how broadband infrastructure has evolved over the years, and how the new network is to be installed. Project initiation activities continued.

August

New maps on the website show the areas that were under investigation for superfast broadband and which were awaiting additional funding. The Expression of Interest for the potential Rural Community Broadband Fund bid was accepted by DeFRA

September

Launch event held in Solihull. A major overhaul of the website took place with a new look and structure and lots of new information, including a video showing how the network will be rolled out. The changes were very well received. We also explained the strategic CuRe process that BT were undertaking – Cu = copper, Re = re-alignment. This is where BT are looking at the existing copper network that has evolved over more than 100 years to ensure that the copper runs are as short as practically possible as broadband does degrade very quickly over runs of copper wire.

October

We carried out the first physical surveys for cabinets. This was an instructive exercise and enabled the team to see at first hand the variables such as the availability of power, planning considerations and highways regulations that can impact on the siting of the new cabinets. At the very end of the month we received new data from BT confirming an additional 6,480 premises above those that were in the original contract would be connected to the fibre network, bringing the total project coverage to over 51,000 homes and businesses – and this is on top of the BT commercial rollout.

November

We applied for State Aid approval for the data that we had received from BT at the end of October. This is necessary to meet our funding requirements and, among other things, ensures that we are not spending money in an area that is to be covered under one or more commercial providers’ rollout plans. New maps published on the website depicting the new data.

December

We are still awaiting State Aid approval from BDUK, which we are informed will be received before Christmas. Also eagerly anticipating the first 12-month rolling plan and, as always, we will make the information available as soon as we are able to. In the meantime, we are continuing to respond to specific queries, working on the data that has been received, and actively seeking out additional funding. On that note, we are hoping that an announcement will be made in the Autumn Statement that is due on 5^th December about the additional £250m Government funding – more news about that in the next newsletter

Rightmove to show broadband speeds on property details

Rightmove is an online property sales and rental database and now shoes “typical” speeds for each of the 1 million+ homes listed on its website. The data is provided by Point Topic and will show what the average speed is and what can be achieved with it. If superfast is not yet available but a go-live date has been announced this will also be shown. This is a very positive move as we have several instances of people who have moved from towns into the countryside only to find that the broadband that they had come to take for granted was not available. It should be noted that there are local variables that mean the data may not always be accurate, for instance distance from the cabinet and all the other factors that we have mentioned previously.

Key dates looking forward

There is some confusion over dates for different targets for broadband so here’s the key dates:

Thank You

It only remains to say a massive THANK YOU to all of our Champions, to those who have completed surveys and to those who have emailed or contacted us through social media with your comments and questions. Your input and feedback has been brilliant. Together we have shaped the project thus far and, to be honest, have become equally frustrated at the rate of progress. It now feels as though we are on the threshold of a real leap forward. Thank you for your forbearance – 2014 promises to be an exciting time!