05 Feb 2010

Conservatives announce broadband plans

Conservative Party plans for a new 100 Mb super-fast broadband network could come to fruition if they win the next general election.

Nigel Hawthorn, vice-president of Europe, Middle East and African marketing for Blue Coat Systems, said this new network could provide a significant boost to the data management efficiencies of firms across the country and would be a welcome move.

He commented: "Businesses can benefit from easier communication and users benefit from new services so far not even available."

Mr Hawthorn added, however, that while increasing broadband bandwidth would help to reduce congestion in the network, it would not necessarily translate into faster download times for users, as the rate of transfer is dependent on the distance the data has to travel.

According to Akamai, the UK is presently ranked 26th in the world in terms of its average broadband speed at 3.5 Mb per second (Mbps).

South Korea was found to have the fastest download rate at 14.6 Mbps.