Virgin Media has launched a
50mbps broadband service for consumers, but at a high
price.
The service uses faster fibre networks and costs £51 a month.
Those taking an £11 a month Virgin phone service will see the cost
reduced to £35 a month.
BT users currently
get around 8mbps from around £16 a month. BT will conduct
customer trials for its own fibre broadband service next
summer.
The Virgin service, which is being rolled out to homes over the
next six months, is only available in areas of the country served
by cable TV networks.
Potential Virgin customers for the fibre service will be hoping
the price will come down steadily as take-up increases.
When BT launched it's first 500kbps (0.5mbps) broadband service
eight years ago, the monthly cost was around £50 a month.