Telewest in first broadband aggregation win

Telewest Business has won the first broadband services contract awarded by one of the nine English regional aggregation boards, known as ADITs, set up by the government last July to bolster broadband adoption.

Under the £80,000 contract awarded by ADIT North East, Telewest will supply five 10Mbps and two 100Mbps connections to three colleges: North Tyneside, Tynemouth and South Tyneside.

ADIT North East's remit is to aggregate broadband demand in the region for a preselected list of 17 service providers.

The new infrastructure has already been earmarked to form part of Tyneside's Object Warehouse for Learning (Owl) project, which aims to provide a central e-learning facility in the Tyne and Wear area.

The first phase of the Owl project is the connection of the three colleges, but it is expected that others will be added later.

"By offering the most competitive all-round solution Telewest Business has clearly demonstrated full understanding of the concept of regional aggregation, and we look forward to working with the company again in the future," said Ed Brown, chief executive at ADIT North East, in a statement.

Christopher Small, director of public sector at Telewest Business, said: "We are confident we can play a major role in the drive to deliver broadband in this arena. We have put a specialist team in place to work with the ADITs."