It will cost “somewhere between £5bn and £15bn” to bring the UK up to par with the broadband capabilities of the rest of the developed world, according to futurologist Peter Cochrane.
This figure could pay for every home and office in the UK to be hooked up to optical fibre and the ultra-fast broadband speeds it provides.
Cochrane said: "On a national scale this is truly an insignificant amount of money. Yet the potential for economic rejuvenation is far greater than for any other sector or investment," he said, referring to the £500bn that some experts have claimed is required to bring the UK's rail, road and air infrastructure up to scratch.
Cochrane, who was head of BT Research in the 1990s, says that despite what is being said by politicians in the run-up to the 6 May general election, Britain is lagging behind a multitude of countries in the global broadband revolution.
"In the mind of government, the UK is at the forefront of the broadband revolution. Unfortunately, we are not even in the top 10. Our ranking is actually somewhere between 20th and 30th," he said.
He estimates that leading economies attribute more than two per cent growth in GDP to broadband expansion. Currently, Korea and Japan offer the best broadband capabilities in the world.
“So the clock is ticking. The UK has to grasp the nettle, stop all debate, and get on with the job.”
Cochrane added that in the future, we are going to see manufacturing industry transformed by 3D replicators and networked operations across the planet.
“But without the infrastructure we won't be able to compete,” he concluded.
Well you can blame BT for the backward mess that is the UK broadband. Way back when it was dragged screaming out of its government paymasters' hands, it insisted on being able to keep and control all the switching units, and so kept control of all lines into homes and offices. After a while, offices were freed up, but others never really got a look-in, so this over-staffed, heavy-footed giant was allowed to stomp its big foot over all objections to its way of doing things.
We need strong government laws that allow whoever is the best at providing broadband to compete with BT. It does not matter a fig if it is UK owned, as it shall be UK workers doing most of the work anyway.
So come on you twits, there is more to life than Radios 3 and 4 and counting sheep or sniffing greens in the Cotswolds. Let's pull our collective fingers out and get this 21st century project up and running.
Posted by: patrick franklynge 27 Apr 2010
Though I am all for superfast broadband speeds in the UK and have enjoyed them in Asia Pacific, I am wondering whether one can really state that they are "broadband capabilities of the rest of the developed world" when the US is at par or behind the UK, and does not appear to have lost competitiveness as a result.
Posted by: Jem Eskenazi 26 Apr 2010
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