Openreach CEO Clive Selley on the health of the UK broadband market

A fantastic day, actually. It's a real privilege to be here with thousands, literally thousands, of people from the UK digital connectivity industry. And for me, this is a celebration of all that's been achieved since the last Connected Britain, and I genuinely believe we're taking the UK forward. So as a collective coming together, debating the issues, very, very productive.

Well, in my terms, I think it is super healthy. It's super healthy if you think back to three or four years ago when we had very little fiber infrastructure in the UK. Look at where we've come: 52% of UK households now able to access full fiber from one or more of the players here at Connected Britain, investing at a phenomenal rate. I mean, billions of pounds going into the network in the UK right now, and as far as I can see, no slowdown. In fact, if there is a new agenda, it is keep building as furiously as ever, but also connect. There's a big not pivot, but a sort of dual-track priority now: connect people to your network. Really proud to say that we're approaching 12 million of platform and 3.8 million connected, but also equally proud to say that the alternate community are building furiously as well, and they are raising connection rates as well. Britain, the people of Britain, the businesses of Britain are benefiting. And of course, Equinox 2 was allowed by Ofcom earlier this year.

I think it's really important, not least because it was actually designed by my customers, not so much by me. So you know, this is Openreach listening to its CP customers, responding with pricing and propositions that meet their need and my need to connect people to this huge and ever-growing full fiber, super reliable, incredibly fast platform. Right, so it's a collaborative thing, Equinox 2. So I was always confident that it would be approved by the regulator. It's a tool now for the big CPs and the small CPs alike to get out there and connect and get the benefits of ultra-fast fiber for consumers and businesses right across this land.

Yeah, I think some level of consolidation is inevitable. You know, I see well over 100 alternates out there, and that possibly is not what we're going to see in five years' time. And I'm listening on the panel actually, you know, some of the bigger alternates do sound like they are interested in being consolidators. So I think some level of consolidation is likely, and it is healthy. So we look forward to the developments in that space. What I would say is highly unlikely to involve Openreach.

Yeah, so I was very, very interested here at Connected Britain to listen to Amber Pine, who runs Broadband for Sky. Sky are an enormous broadband service provider in the UK, and she was talking about the fact that people don't really understand, in very big numbers actually, quite what fiber optic broadband is and how it differs from the hybrid VDSL technology that they are used to. Right, so there's a big job to be done, I think, by the retail service providers educating end customers.

I think my biggest message to the audience is: let's celebrate the achievements of this whole industry over these last few years, because it's phenomenal. When you look back how far we've come in such a short amount of time, it's incredible. The money we've invested in glass in this country is awesome. The regulatory framework has enabled that investment, and what I want to see from the next regulatory arrangement, WFTMR 26, is consistency, continuity. It's a winning formula, WFTMR 21, and we need it continued so that we get a decade of predictable, stable environment in which we can knowingly invest.

Thank you very much.