CityFibre selects STL for optical fibre deployment

CityFibre, the UK’s largest independent Full Fibre platform, has signed a deal with STL, an integrator of digital networks.
Optical fiber investment|
India-based STL will supply Celesta Intelligently Bonded Ribbon [IBR] Cables with Stellar bend-insensitive fibre and ribbon optimized joint enclosures to CityFibre.

CityFibre is in the process of making an investment of £4 billion to expand its coverage to 8 million homes by 2025 – approximately one third of the UK market. It is in talks with the UK Government to explore opportunities to support BDUK’s Project Gigabit program to bring Full Fibre to rural communities.

More than one million homes are already able to receive Full Fibre broadband from CityFibre, with 26 construction companies mobilized and in build across over 63 towns and cities. By the end of 2022, CityFibre plans to have builds underway across more than 150 cities, towns and villages before expanding to 285 by 2025.

STL’s IBR ribbon cable solution will deliver nearly 25 percent faster installations and contribute to CityFibre’s build-out plans.

CityFibre has secured long-term commitments from Vodafone, TalkTalk and Zen, and has attracted regional Full Fibre ISPs to the market.

STL recently acquired Clearcomm to augment its deployment and management capabilities and IDS for enabling data centre connectivity.

“Working together we will secure the technology and supplies CityFibre needs to achieve its ambitious targets. STL’s IBR cabling technology and other supplies will play a key role in accelerating our build in more locations,” James Thomas, Director of Supply Chain at CityFibre, said in a news statement.

“Our integrated optical connectivity solution with optical fibre, cable and interconnect products, will help CityFibre achieve accelerated network rollout with high scalability and agility, while keeping the overall costs low,” Paul Atkinson, CEO, Optical Networking Business, STL said.

London-based CityFibre is owned by Antin Infrastructure Partners, Goldman Sachs Asset Management, Mubadala Investment Company and Interogo Holding.