Telecoms giant BT is going to inject a further £1 billion into the development of a nationwide superfast broadband network.

The new money will go towards providing two thirds of the UK with superfast broadband access by the end of 2015.

In the past BT has said that it hopes to be able to get fibre optic broadband rolled out for 40 per cent of the UK in time for 2012 and the Olympic Games in London. Its minimum download speed target for these connections was set at 40Mbps, which is currently the maximum which its tiny number of fibre-to-the-cabinet (FTTC) customers can achieve.

Before 2010 ends BT will bring the first four million customers the opportunity to access its next generation high speed broadband network and with the additional funds it will be able to extend the reach of its fibre optic cabling to even more households.

BT recently announced that its financial performance was finally on the up, with profits of £1 billion recently posted. This was after serious losses in the previous year, which resulted in job losses, cost cutting and general streamlining of its entire business.

The luckiest BT broadband customers will have full fibre coverage delivered right into their homes, with download speeds of 100Mbps possible. The majority will be FTTC customers, but this is still a technology which vastly outpaces current ADSL connections.

Simple Broadband’s Communications Manager Simon Gerrard said “The current range of BT broadband deals are about to get a lot more interesting as it commits to this large investment into next-generation technology. Experts agree that fibre optic broadband is the only service which can continue to further the possibility of online entertainment and information and so BT’s funding of this will be welcomed.”

TalkTalk, one of the UK’s largest broadband providers, has said that it will be working to extend the availability of its flagship internet packages to more consumers around the country.

TalkTalk currently offers its basic services to about 80 per cent of the country, which tops its closest rival O2’s 70 per cent availability in UK households. Now TalkTalk says that it will be rolling out its coverage to make sure that 90 per cent of the nation can choose its broadband.

In a press release, TalkTalk said that the 1700 unbundled exchanges that it operates in the UK would be growing to 2000 over the next year. It also said that the speeds of its broadband service would be rising in order to meet the public appetite for data, which experts say is increasing by 50 per cent a year.

TalkTalk is currently trialling its own fibre optic service using the same Infinity network that is bringing about BT broadband deals that have a maximum download speed of 40Mbps. This is the fibre-to-the-cabinet (FTTC) technology that has been implemented in a number of areas to date and it is, as yet, available in only a limited number of locations.

By next spring BT is hoping to bring high speed ADSL2+ broadband to about 20 million UK customers, which is a more ambitious plan than many of its main provider rivals, although its monopoly over the UK’s broadband infrastructure allows it to develop technologies and services at its own pace.

TalkTalk is proving to be a serious contender in the UK broadband provider market, as its recent acquisitions of smaller firms such as AOL and Tiscali have significantly increased its user base and allowed it to gain market share from established rivals.

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has revealed statistics which place the UK in the bottom third of a list of global nations in terms of average broadband connection speeds.

The UK ranked just 21st out of the list of the world’s 30 most developed nations in terms of broadband speeds and infrastructure, which means fellow EU states including Spain, Greece and Portugal are higher placed.

The OECD said that the results proved that investment in fibre optic technology was key to improving average broadband speeds. Although the UK is ranked 13th in the list when the level of broadband penetration is considered, a majority of UK customers take advantage of BT broadband deals that utilise ADSL technology rather than the faster fibre optic cable connections.

Japan outstripped the UK significantly, topping the charts with a maximum advertised download speed of 1Gbps according to the report. A majority of Japanese broadband customers connect to the internet using fibre optic technology, whilst on average only one in ten broadband customers in the global market have such an opportunity.

Government subsidies are helping nations including the US, Sweden and Norway to install the next-generation of broadband technology. The report claims that health, education, transportation and electricity industries all benefit from faster broadband and that these economic benefits far outweigh the initial cost of rolling out the fibre optic technology.

The OECD report has shown that the UK’s broadband tax and the funds that it generates could well be the best way forward if the government is to fully implement next-generation broadband technology over the coming years. However, critics believe that this process is not occurring quickly enough and there is little doubt that the UK still has some way to go before its average download speeds achieved via standard BT broadband deals can begin to approach those of the top nations.

News about the Government’s proposed plan to tax each and every household with a phone line in order to raise money for the development of cheap cable broadband and high speed mobile broadband connections in the future has been circulating for some time. However, as more details become available, will the average family actually benefit from the tax, or is there a better way in which to invest in our future?

According to official reports, a monthly charge of 50p will be added to every home phone bill in the UK, totalling an extra £6 a year for those affected. However, analysis of the new rules to be enforced by Revenue and Customs actually suggests that for millions of people this charge could be significantly higher.

VAT will be charged on top of the flat tax rate, which in itself will increase the cost by 17.6 percent when VAT is restored to its original level on 1st January 2010. According to a leaked document this will mean an extra £30 million a year will find its way into the public purse as the tax itself becomes subject to taxation.

In addition, it seems that the charge will not be levied against individual homes, but will rather be based on the number of lines connected to any one property. As such a home with two phone lines rather than one will be charged £6 a year for each line, plus VAT.

This means that people with cheap cable broadband connections using fibre optic technology who also have a copper BT landline will be charged for both connections, even if they only use the fibre optic line for broadband.

The problem could be more severe for businesses and the CBI has called for a detailed breakdown as to how the tax will affect enterprises with multiple landline connections.

Wednesday saw the Queen’s speech used as a platform from which the Government could announce various new pieces of legislation. The most important news for broadband users was the announcement of the Digital Economy Bill, which will change the rules relating to illegal file-sharing and online piracy.

Those who download illegally will first be contacted and urged to cease and desist. If they ignore the warnings, they could have their connections limited as pressure is put on internet service providers to take the issues of file sharing more seriously.

The most persistent offenders could face having their internet connections disabled altogether, resulting in a system that would effectively ban those who do not respect copyright laws. The UK music industry has welcomed the plans, but lobbyists who campaign for information freedom in the digital age believe that the new rules could penalise people unnecessarily.

The new bill is also set to further establish plans for the growth of a high-speed broadband network across the UK. On Monday, the Digital Britain minister Stephen Timms told a broadband conference in Leeds that there was a governmental commitment to get the next generation of broadband connectivity into over 90% of UK households within the next 8 years. BT broadband deals which offer 20Mbps connections are representative of the first wave of this new, faster broadband infrastructure.

In order to pay for the BT broadband deals of the future the 50p broadband tax, levied against phone bills for UK customers, is still going ahead. This will further supplement the £170 million that is being injected into the industry in order to achieve universal broadband coverage by 2012.

Although an increasing number of providers are gradually offering 20Mbps connections, further telephone exchanges need to be converted to the new technology to enable a greater number of UK residents to connect at high speeds in the future.

Consumers around the country are constantly hunting for the cheapest mobile broadband in the UK. In many cases this involves using price comparison sites to size up the various deals. Prices will vary according to the volume of data a customer anticipates using every month and in most cases these limits must be strictly observed in order to avoid paying extra.

As you may expect, there is industry pressure to alter the way in which consumers pay for their mobile broadband usage as usage levels and user numbers continue to grow, placing ever greater pressure on the available bandwidth. Falling prices also mean that companies are having to handle a 400% rise in mobile broadband use, offset only marginally by a meagre 40% rise in real revenues.

News from a recent study by Camiant showed that consumers and the networks are in agreement about one thing: the structure of mobile broadband price plans is in need of a serious rethink. It is clear from the study that consumers could be faced with ever stricter data limit enforcement, resulting in significant penalties for exceeding their allowance and as such a different approach, such as connection management, would be preferable.

The survey also revealed that consumers across Europe are actually unsure as to the rules and restrictions of their existing mobile broadband price plans, with data caps confusing many and ignored by even more. As such, a price structure which restricts mobile broadband speeds during peak periods but has a relaxed approach to overall data allowance would be seen to be the best solution to everyone’s problems.

It was also revealed that consumers would encourage networks to offer unlimited usage for a single mobile broadband function, for example gaming or downloading, whilst retaining the data cap for other applications. It is clear that flexibility and customisation are going to be integral to delivering the cheapest mobile broadband in the UK in years to come.

Wireless broadband prices are falling across the board and mobile broadband is becoming ever more popular, despite criticisms levelled at download speeds and levels of 3G network coverage. The news that Mac owners are having issues with compatibility has therefore come as a something of a shock to the industry.

Last week it was revealed that Mac owners who had upgraded to the Snow Leopard operating system were experiencing serious issues if they tried to use their mobile broadband dongles with the new software. In most cases this rendered their mobile broadband connection inaccessible. The networks responded with various levels of concern to these issues.

In the event that your mobile broadband service ceases to work because of a software issue, the Office of Fair Trading has come out in support of Mac owners with several useful pieces of advice. It is legally assured that consumers should not only receive products which perform correctly, but more importantly that they perform in the way in which they were advertised.

Mac owners with Snow Leopard whose mobile broadband dongle does not work are entitled to an explanation and assistance from the network and are advised to contact the Citizen’s Advice Bureau if this is not forthcoming. If your mobile broadband dongle was explicitly advertised as Mac-compatible then you have even more weight behind your complaint.

Most networks have now released fixes for the issue, although some are considered to be more difficult to perform than others and networks offering mobile broadband continue to advertise their dongles as compatible with Macs despite the persistent evidence to the contrary. Low wireless broadband prices may not be enough to quell public anger.

The OFT advises consumers to complain if they are unhappy with any form of broadband connection and problems which place the provider in violation of the terms of a broadband contract could well be grounds enough for you to legally cancel your contract before the minimum term.

According to a broadband expert, it is unlikely that fixed line broadband connections will ever be replaced or superseded by the mobile broadband alternatives. The comments were made by Edd Dawson, the editor of a UK broadband specialist site, although Dawson is not alone in questioning the viability and sustainability of mobile broadband services.

The reasoning behind the argument is that consumers will continue to purchase mobile broadband only as a supplementary connection to their existing fixed line service. This is because mobile broadband costs are comparatively higher than fixed line equivalents, whilst real speeds have been revealed in a recent survey to be far lower than most manufacturers are willing to admit.

Dawson likens the continued relevance of home broadband to the fate of desktop PCs, which in the face of stiff competition from laptops and netbooks are still managing to sell well. Laptops, like mobile broadband, are considered to be ideal for casual and occasional use, but not as a replacement for a powerful desktop PC with a fast home broadband connection.

It is believed that the same theory can be applied across the whole spectrum of users, with home owners as well as businesses sticking with the reliability and availability of fixed line broadband whilst complimenting this connection with the roaming capabilities of mobile broadband.

The future of mobile broadband as a primary connection has been further brought into question due to the wider availability of cheap cable broadband in the UK. Cable has several advantages over both ADSL and mobile broadband and with its faster and more consistent connection speeds it is likely to continue to grow in popularity.

Cheap cable broadband may also become more widely available as BT develops its fibre networks, in competition with the current kings of cable, Virgin Media.

The future is, of course, hard to predict as anyone who remembers similar reservations directed at car phones in the 1980s will attest.

A report from Cisco has said that broadband quality and reach in the UK ranks just 25^th in a worldwide league table.

This may sound like bad news, especially when considering some of the less developed countered higher up the table. However, Cisco has made it clear that the UK?s broadband network is adequate for today?s requirements but, more importantly, that its position is likely to improve.

Broadly speaking we agree with this assessment. The increase in fibre networks and the Digital Britain project will vastly improve provision of broadband in the UK such that it will be able to keep pace with the ever increasing requirements of the broadband users in the UK.