WightFibre becomes first operator to switch off its copper network in the UK
Broadband Internet Service Provider WightFibre says it has become the first UK telecoms provider to switch off its old copper network.
WightFibre, which covers the Isle of Wight, has recently pledged to invest £94 million to support its “Gigabit Island Project” which will see a new Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband network rollout to around 78,000 premises, covering roughly 96 per cent of the island, by the end of 2023. As of July 2022, the operator has reached 40,000 premises and aims to complete 60,000 by the end of the year.
John Irvine, CEO of WightFibre, said: “Our big copper switch-off was a major undertaking. For most customers the migration to full-fibre was seamless – their existing phones and analogue devices are supported on the new network with the notable exception of rotary dial telephones – thankfully there were only a few of those.”
Customers who were still using the old copper network were upgraded to full fibre earlier this year and the last few phone-only customers were also upgraded during the summer, meaning that the old copper network could be decommissioned.
John Irvine commented: “A small number of customers with very old alarm systems did need to upgrade their alarm systems as these are incompatible with full-fibre. With business customers, this extended to some older dial-up credit card machines and fax machines. In any case, WightFibre helped with these changes to persuade customers to upgrade. Overall the process ran fairly smoothly. Our customers love the new network, the faster speeds, and the much-improved reliability.”
WightFibre's decommissioning of its copper network foreshadows a pattern that will ultimately happen across the UK, with KCOM, Virgin Media and BT Openreach all planning to switch off their copper networks. However, it is expected that these will take longer to be ready.
Openreach’s copper line network is not expected to be switched off until around the mid-2030s and the operator will stop its PTSN/ISDN services from December 2025. Existing services will continue until that time, but the operator is expected to issue local "stop-sell" orders before then, meaning that customers will no longer be able to order the services new.
Virgin Media is expected to have upgraded to full fibre by around 2028, however, it may not be able to migrate all customers straight away.
