BT brings forward broadband plans

By Georgina Prodhan and Kate Holton

LONDON (Reuters) - BT Group (BT.L) is bringing forward the first phase of its plans to make faster broadband via fibre available to homes and businesses, showing the company has not been hampered by problems at its Global Services unit.

BT said on Thursday it plans to cover 1.5 million homes with services offering broadband speeds of up to 40 megabits per second, fast enough to stream high-definition video, by summer 2010, with a million covered by March.

Its original plan was to cover half a million by March.

BT said it was not changing its total investment of 1.5 billion pounds as it aims to cover 40 percent of Britain, or about 10 million homes, by 2012.

Steve Robertson, chief executive of the division responsible for the roll-out, said BT had decided to push ahead faster with the programme after receiving strong responses from regional authorities and the wider industry which will be able to access the network.

BT's vow to push ahead with the investment is also likely to reassure analysts and investors that problems at Global Services have not distracted or hampered the rest of the business.

BT said in May it was taking a 1.58 billion pounds writedown on Global Services, a supplier of IT services to multinational companies, following a review of the division and some of its more over-optimistic contracts.

Most coverage from the broadband investment will be through fibre to the cabinet (FTTC), which uses copper for the last part of the connection, between a street cabinet where the fibre-optic cable ends and the building to be connected.