The firm behind the rollout of the National Broadband Plan — National Broadband Ireland (NBI) — has said it remains on track and on budget to connect more than 420,000 premises by the end of next year.
The National Broadband Plan was signed off in November 2019 with the aim to provide high-speed broadband to 560,000 premises across the country providing access to 1.1m people. The rollout is expected to be completed by 2027.
NBI has said to date it has made high-speed fibre broadband available to over 55% of the premises in the intervention area and the “rollout is expected to deliver on schedule and on budget”.
According to its latest update, NBI has completed the initial survey stage on 96% of premises in the intervention area — 540,119.
There have been 483,594 premises moved to or through the construction phase.
NBI is a wholesale network operator and does not sell fibre broadband directly to its users. Rather it enables services from a range of broadband providers or Retail Service Providers.
The number of premises passed, and which can connect to NBI’s fibre network is 310,676.
Approximately 104,517 premises are connected to the NBI network.
The NBI infrastructure is already live on 10 of the 27 islands included in the rollout, while the remaining 17 islands are in various stages of survey and design works.
“When a premises is passed, an order can be placed by the occupant to connect to high-speed fibre broadband on the NBI network through their own choice of one of the 72 participating broadband providers,” the company said.
Chief executive Peter Hendrick said all at the company are “working hard” to ensure that the rollout “stays on track and we have now achieved and exceeded our targets for 2024”.
“Next year, we aim to have passed over 420,000 homes, businesses, and farms, which will leave us in a strong position to complete our rollout program in line with our contractual commitments,” he said.
Following the completion of the work, NBI will continue to operate the network and connect new homes and businesses for the next 20 years.