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East Midlands firms welcome super-fast broadband upgrade
The launch of a super-fast broadband service in Heanor has been praised by local businesses.
A group of firms based at the Heanor Gate industrial estate in Heanor, located in Derbyshire's Amber Valley district, teamed up last year to call for faster broadband to be rolled out in the area after hearing that the town was set to miss out on fibre optic connectivity, reports the Ilkeston Advertiser.
As a result, the technology has now gone live in the Heanor business zone, although the rest of the town faces waiting until 2015 to gain access to the service.
Harry Skidmore, chief executive of local company Easibind, revealed the firm was considering relocating due to its slow broadband connection but has now decided to stay put thanks to the infrastructure improvement work.
Before the upgrades took place, it typically took more than 24 hours to download very large files, he explained.
"It's going to improve our competitiveness overall and will improve our ability to take on contracts," Mr Skidmore commented.
His sentiments were echoed by Andy Tomlinson, general manager of Autosplice, who said the super-fast broadband network will allow large volumes of traffic to flow through the firm's engineering department and ease communication with colleagues around the world.
Operations director for Promopack Digital Studios Jayne Blake said customers were confused about why it took the company so long to respond when sending and receiving digital files - a problem caused by the slow broadband link.
She added: "This new installation puts not just Promopack, but all businesses on the Heanor Gate industrial park, in a great position to win new business in the East Midlands."
The business leaders' remarks come shortly after BT revealed that its next-generation copper broadband service has gone live to a further 13,000 properties in Derbyshire, bringing faster speeds to Breadsall, Whitwell and Horsley.