Virgin Media broadband and its parent company, Liberty Global, have announced that the quad-play company has set aside a cool £3 billion to boost its broadband digital infrastructure in what it calls its single biggest capital investment.
Up to 4 million additional UK homes and businesses are expected to be connected to the Virgin Media's network and accessing downstream speeds of up 152Mbps, a move that will see Virgin Media's foothold increase by almost a third to 17 million connection points.
Virgin Media owner Liberty Global also disclosed that it will be trialling DOCSIS 3.1 technology in Europe later this year, which could help customers reach speeds of up to 10Gbps in the future (probably using this chip).
Lighting cables
"Project Lightning", as it is called, will also see 6000 new jobs created by 2020, with 1,000 of them being new apprenticeships. It is also expected to boost the British economy by up to £8 billion.
Virgin Media also mentioned that prospective customers can influence their decision by "upvoting" their areas at virginmedia.com/cablemystreet.
The company has already started to expand its fibre optic network in East London with an estimated 100,000 homes and businesses expected to be connected.
