BT unveils undersea cable project to bring faster broadband to Isles of Scilly

British fixed line incumbent BT has said it will undertake what it has called ‘the most ambitious project ever undertaken in the UK to bring superfast broadband to a remote community’, outlining plans to divert unused fibre-optic cables on the Atlantic Ocean seabed to the Isles of Scilly. The plans forms part of the GBP132 million (USD198 million) Superfast Cornwall initiative between the European Regional Development Fund, BT and Cornwall Council, which aims to deliver faster broadband throughout Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly in 2014; the telco expects the cable scheme to cost around GBP3.7 million. The first Isles of Scilly customers will be connected during the first half of 2014, and BT has said that a cable ship will spend around a month later this year cutting and moving two cables, which had previously been used for communications between the UK and Ireland and Spain.