Superfast broadband is good for business, according to Lancashire County Council’s cabinet member responsible for economic development.
The Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport revealed earlier today (Monday 29 January) that it had reached its national target of making superfast broadband available to 95% of the country.
In Lancashire, superfast broadband has 97% coverage.
Lancashire County Councillor Michael Green, Cabinet member for economic development, environment and planning, said: “The Superfast Lancashire project is a great example of the county council working in partnership with the private sector.
“This has delivered increased broadband speeds, which helps residents by opening up new services, but perhaps more importantly it has opened up new opportunities for business.
“Online services provide a global audience for Lancashire business, so it’s vital to have the right infrastructure in place to support the needs of the private sector, which creates new jobs and helps to grow the Lancashire economy.”
The county has already surpassed the national average and reached more than 97% coverage, with around 746,000 households and businesses having access to superfast speeds of 24Mbps and above – and these numbers continue to grow.
This coverage in Lancashire has been delivered through a combination of commercial coverage from Openreach, Virgin and smaller companies like B4RN and the publicly-funded Superfast Lancashire programme.
Superfast Lancashire focuses on the non-commercial areas. By the end of this year, it will have delivered Superfast broadband access to over 150,000 households and businesses and invested £30m of public money.