Openreach, the UK’s largest digital network business, has selected STL as a partner to provide optical cable solutions for its Full Fibre broadband network.
STL will be responsible for delivering millions of kilometres of optical fibre cable to support the build over the next three years. Openreach has plans to use STL’s expertise and innovation to help accelerate its Full Fibre build program and drive efficiency.

Openreach plans to utilize STL’s Opticonn fibre, cable and interconnect offerings to drive significant performance improvements, including up to 30 percent faster installation.

Openreach will also have access to STL’s Celesta – a high-density optical fibre cable with a capacity of up to 6,912 optical fibres. This compact design is 26 percent slimmer compared to traditional loose tube cables, allowing 2000 metres of cable to be installed in under an hour. The high density super-slim cable will also help minimise the use of plastic across Openreach’s new network.

Kevin Murphy, MD for Fibre and Network Delivery at Openreach, said: “Our Full Fibre network build is going faster than ever. We need partners like STL on board to not only help sustain that momentum, but also to provide the skills and innovation to help us go even further.”

Ankit Agarwal, CEO Connectivity Solutions Business, STL, said: “Our customized optical solutions are ideally suited for Openreach’s future-proof network requirements and we believe they will enable next-gen digital experiences for homes and businesses across UK.”

Openreach’s Full Fibre broadband program aims to reach 20 million homes and businesses by the mid-to-late 2020s. Openreach engineers are delivering faster, more reliable connectivity to another 42,000 homes and businesses every week, or the equivalent of a home every 15 seconds. 4.5 million premises can now order a gigabit capable Full Fibre broadband service from competing service providers using Openreach’s new network.