As broadband providers battle for position, the rural businesses
that stand to benefit wait in frustration.
Jane Dudman
reports.
The telecoms industry has dominated the debate over the UK's
broadband internet infrastructure. While BT has defended its
position, the competition has complained about an unfair
competitive environment. Yet we have heard hardly a peep from the
businesses that are supposed to benefit from new faster internet
services.
UK companies are growing increasingly impatient over the long wait
for broadband services, which they see as crucial to developing
their businesses and cutting costs.
Three-quarters of UK companies feel broadband will help them cut
costs, according to a recent survey from the Institute of
Directors. Some 63% of UK small and medium-sized enterprises are
online, but only 10% of those are happy with their existing
bandwidth, the survey found.
Frustration is growing among firms still without access to
high-speed networking, with 78% of firms in the IoD survey
highlighting lack of local service as one of the main inhibitors to
adopting broadband.
The problem of broadband availability is so marked in rural areas
that many local authorities are now running initiatives to bring
suppliers into the market.
Last week, Lincolnshire council announced it had secured £4.2m in
European funding, which it will use to subsidise local businesses.
Meanwhile, in Wales, Caerphilly County Borough Council has
announced a multimillion-pound partnership with BT to implement
broadband and make the service available to local businesses at a
subsidised rate.
Most businesses in rural areas need broadband to improve their
communications. "We export refurbished caravans to clients in the
whole of Europe and most customers now want photographs of our
stock before they buy," said Steve Thomas, managing director of
caravan sales company I & S Davies. "We are e-mailing enormous
attachments all the time and with normal copper they take half an
hour. Broadband is absolutely essential."
I & S Davies, which employs 16 staff and has a turnover of £2m,
has applied to the Welsh Development Agency for a grant towards the
cost of satellite broadband.
Falmouth-based business Kimberley's Independent Estate Agents,
which employs 15 staff, has recently ordered broadband from the
Actnow scheme, a joint initiative between BT, Cornwall Enterprise
and Cornwall County Council to provide subsidised high speed
networks to Cornish firms.
Kimberley's will pay just under £20 a month for a 512kbps
connection between its Truro and Falmouth offices, which will speed
up the transfer of property details by e-mail.
"If customers want details of properties, we will be able to react
straightaway," said Mandy Pryor, IT manager at Kimberley's.
"We would love to be able to dial up client machines and sort out
their problems over the wide area," said Guy Marshall, director of
computer software and support firm Techronics, based in
Lincolnshire market town Sleaford. "Given that my nearest client is
20 miles away, that would save me a huge amount of time. With an
always-on broadband link, in you go and the job is done."
Sleaford is about to take part in a wireless broadband pilot scheme
being set up by supplier Firstnet Services. Chris Chambers,
managing director of Sleaford-based Associate Computer Services,
said there are a wide range of businesses in the town and its
surrounding area that would benefit from broadband.
"The amount of business on the internet is increasing and we want
to move our customers over to reliable connections," he said.
Rural businesses
David Brunnen, managing director of Hampshire-based e-business
service company ABFL, says many rural niche businesses need
broadband, including farms that want to convert former farm
buildings into managed office space, commercial printers in
low-cost rural locations that need to handle large graphics files,
care homes where managers have to keep up-to-date with regulations
on drugs and medicines, and country house hotels.
"By definition, country house hotels are not in broadband areas,
but they want to provide services to business conferences and
e-mail and internet access for their international guests," he
said.
Key staff in larger enterprises also need rural broadband. Many
company directors have rural homes from which they want to be able
to connect to their business systems.
Jonathan Cummings, director of e-business at the IoD, said, "Our
members are used to high-bandwidth, leased lines in their office
and then they get home and have to struggle with dial-up. They find
it very frustrating."
He said companies want greater access to a choice of broadband
services. "There is a need for greater availability and more
competition. Too often, even if broadband is available, it is only
available from one supplier."
So while the telecoms companies battle to curry favour with the
government and communications regulator, it is businesses on the
ground that bear the brunt of the broadband go-slow.