Infrastructure 2021 Review

The Island’s National Broadband Plan is heading towards the end of the second year of its rollout, and now, at the time of writing, 58% of the Island’s premises have access to ultrafast fibre broadband. It is hoped we reach 60% by the end of the year and will continue to push forward to hit 75% of premises passed by the end of 2022.

Last year, we informed you about a major development in the Isle of Man’s National Telecoms Strategy – the installation of two additional subsea cable landing points in the Isle of Man – serving to enhance the Island’s connectivity to global data networks. We are pleased to report that all on-Island infrastructure was completed in November of this year and the Aqua Comms cable will be live for new connections in Q1 of 2022, enhancing connectivity resilience for residents and businesses alike.

Aside from this, we have been working with local telecoms companies on how 5G is evolving.  The team will continue to monitor this and intend to publish a review and recommendations for the Island in this space in 2022.   The Isle of Man Communication Commission is auctioning spectrum which could facilitate 5G in the future and we will keep abreast of the process and the outcomes.

The development of a data strategy is high on the agenda for the Agency in 2022 and we will be stepping up our efforts to move this forward.  Over the next year we want to issue a strategy and move to implementation. Watch this space.

Richard Oliphant- Digital Infrastructure & Telecommunications, Digital Isle of Man