£40m fibre optic network to link London & Liverpool

Telewest is to plough more than £40 million into a high-capacity fibre optic network linking Liverpool and London, the company disclosed today. The announcement was made in association with Worldwide Fiber Inc and will bolt on to Telewest's existing 2,200 mile fibre optic network in England. Telewest will build the 700 mile network connecting Worldwide Fiber's trans-Atlantic cable station in Southport, near Liverpool, with Worldwide Fiber's point of presence in the Docklands in London. The network will run via Manchester, Sheffield, Birmingham, Nottingham, Cambridge and Bristol, and will be used to carry digital TV and Internet services as well as national and international telephony traffic. Greg Maffei, CEO of Worldwide Fiber, said: "We are developing one of the largest and most advanced fibre optic networks in England. This infrastructure will be at the heart of our network that connects our trans-Atlantic cable to Europe via our gateway in London. It represents a critical leg of our growing international network." Worldwide Fiber is currently completing a 24,000 mile fibre-optic network in North America and Europe, and constructing a trans-Atlantic network connecting Boston and Halifax with Liverpool and Dublin. ®