Telewest announces broadband speed increases

Hot on the heels of NTL's announcement of a 10Mb broadband standard, Telewest has today confirmed changes to its own internet services.

Although not going so far as to make 10Mb a universal minimum, the operator will introduce a new 10Mb option to replace the current 2Mb and 4Mb services (£35/mo).

The standard 1Mb service will become a "super fast" 4Mb service (£25/mo), while the 512K entry-level service will be upgraded to 2Mb (£17.99/mo), effectively making 2Mb the operator's new standard.

Upstream will be increased to 256K for the new 2Mb service and 384K for the others. In a stark contrast to most broadband offerings, all packages will remain free of usage caps.

The upgrades will be conducted free of charge on a region-by-region basis, beginning next month before completion early next year.

"There have been a few ISPs making a fuss about 2Mb services recently, but that often represents the maximum speed they can offer at the moment," said Eric Tveter, president and chief operating officer of Telewest Broadband. "We're making 2Mb our minimum speed and we'll also be offering a choice of affordable 4Mb and 10Mb services for more demanding internet users.

"What's more, our customers will be able to make full use of this extra bandwidth because we won't be introducing caps and all the new speeds will be available across the network. With blueyonder services you actually get what you pay for."

Telewest has also revealed that it has provisions in place to offer speeds higher than 10Mb next year, "should the market dictate". By 2007, the firm added, speeds of up to 50Mb should be possible via DOCSIS 3.