Villager beats the big communications companies with his DIY superfast broadband
A RURAL village has taken technology into its own hands by installing a bespoke superfast broadband system.
The DIY scheme started when Rob Anderson, an IT expert, moved into Iken in Suffolk and was frustrated by the slow internet speeds that made it impossible to browse the internet or work from home. So he decided to install his own superfast broadband, which has resulted in speeds in the village going from 0.25 Mbps to 25 Mbps.
Since then 29 out of the 40 households in Iken have signed up to Mr Anderson’s service, which they say is quicker and cheaper than those provided by the big communications companies.
Mr Anderson began rebooting his village when he discovered the neighbouring hamlet of Snape was able to receive good Wi-fi through underground cables. With permission, the 47-year-old chief technical officer connected with Snape’s fibre broadband and then arranged for the two pubs there, the Plough and Sail and the Crown, to act as base station and relay transmitter.
This allowed him to beam the Wi-fi to Iken via point-to-point links. That was in 2014 and since then 75 per cent of the homes in Iken have signed up to Mr Anderson’s Bootstrap Broadband. He now fields calls from neighbours with IT problems and fixes or replaces equipment if it stops working. Unlike big broadband companies, no one is tied into the service, there is no minimum contract and anyone can cancel or change their package at any time.
Dominic Kilburn, a neighbour, said Mr Anderson had brought the village into the 21st century. He runs a kayak and canoe business and rents out holiday cottages from home, plus he has three children who need internet access for their homework.
He said: “We used various companies – Sky, Talktalk and BT – but whoever we were with and whatever they promised we never got more than 0.5Mbps. It was hopeless.
“We jumped at Rob’s system. It has transformed our internet use.”