Plans to turn village into something‘ultra fast’

Kilbride and Douglas Water.

“The difference that having fibre broadband can make to businesses or to improving the range of services available

Openreach have outlined plans to make ultrafast and future-proof broadband available in Auldhouse.

It’s part of a bigger announcement involving ‘harder to reach’ areas across the UK, with building to start in the next 14 months.

The village will benefit as part of Openreach’s previously stated target to reach four million homes and businesses with ‘full fibre’ technology by the end of March 2021.

T h e Auldhouse build is part of the company’s ambition to extend its new ‘full’ fibre-tothe-premises (FTTP) network outside cities.

The work builds on successful cost busting village trials launched at the end of last year which have seen engineers developing a range of new tools, skills and techniques to help the company build full fibre in areas previously considered too complex or expensive to upgrade.

Robert Thorburn, Openreach’s partnership director for Scotland, said: “This is great news for people living and working in Auldhouse and builds on Openreach’s strong track in the home is amazing. I’d urge everyone to take advantage of the faster speeds now available.

“There’s lots of competition out there record of working in rural areas.

”We’re committing significant capital and resources to rural Scotland in the months and years ahead, including connecting up some of the hardest-to-reach locations.”

MP for East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow, Dr Lisa Cameron, said: “I am delighted that Auldhouse will benefit from full fibre to the premises in the near future. Rural areas of my constituency have been adversely affected by lack of full fibre broadband for too long.

“Auldhouse will now see a benefit for businesses, schools and personal use and I want this benefit to be expanded across all of my constituency. I will continue to work with Openreach to ensure this happens.”

A report by the Centre for Economics & Business Research revealed that connecting everyone in Scotland to ‘full fibre’ broadband by 2025 would create a £4.5 billion boost to the nation’s economy.

The report also revealed that 37,400 people in Scotland could be brought back into the workforce through enhanced connectivity. and people may find they could be surfing at much higher speeds at a similar cost to their current service, but the key is for customers to contact one or more service