Athlone Town Hall
Minister Naughten Reveals That 8,000 Athlone Homes & Businesses To Have Access to SIRO’s Gigabit Broadband Network
Minister for Communications, Climate Action & Environment Denis Naughten TD provided an update today on SIRO’s rollout at an event in the Sheraton Athlone Hotel in association with Athlone Chamber of Commerce. Minister Naughten outlined that 8,000 homes and businesses in Athlone will have access to SIRO’s 1 Gigabit broadband network, as well as revealing Airwire as SIRO’s broadband retail partner.
Airwire was established in the start of 2006 with the aim of providing broadband to areas in the West of Ireland which were previously underserved. The Kinvara, Co. Galway based company with offices in Athlone will begin to offer services in the town in Spring 2018, as well as offering broadband powered by SIRO in Ennis, Limerick and Portlaoise, with more towns added to its rollout over the coming months. Customers interested in availing of Airwires’s SIRO powered broadband can log onto Airwire.ie with packages available from €50.00 a month.
SIRO’s rollout in Athlone has commenced in the Bushfield/Cornamaddy/Woodville estates (Blackberry Lane, Drunnaconn, The Orchard and Coill Ur) and in the Garrycastle and Monksland areas. When construction is completed by the end of Spring 2018 approximately 8,000 homes and business premises in Athlone will have access to SIRO’s 100% fibre-optic broadband network. As SIRO is an open access wholesale provider, customers will purchase broadband services from one of SIRO’s retail partners such as Airwire, Vodafone or Sky.
Minister for Communications, Climate Action & Environment Denis Naughten TD said:
“Access to Gigabit connectivity will provide an important boost to Athlone and the surrounding area, who will now be able to take advantage of the same high-speed broadband as leading international hubs such as Tokyo and Hong Kong. It is also fantastic to see Airwire able to take advantage of SIRO’s services and offer broadband packages in the community. Today’s announcement forms part of the Government strategy that I am overseeing to give every premise in Ireland access to high-speed broadband as quickly as possible through a combination of commercial and State-led investment.”
Commenting on the announcement, Sean Atkinson, SIRO CEO, said:
“We’re delighted to unveil Airwire as our latest retail partner, giving residents and businesses more choice to experience SIRO’s Gigabit connectivity, which is three times as powerful as the market leading service in Dublin and 10 times as powerful as the average service in Ireland. As our eighth retailer, this Airwire partnership is indicative of how SIRO is driving competition in the broadband market, with more partners due to begin offering services over the coming months.”
Martin List-Petersen, CTO of Airwire, added:
“We have always believed that people living in regional Ireland should have access to broadband of the same quality available to living in cities. Thanks to SIRO, our customers will now be guaranteed the best broadband in the country, delivered at the speed of light, using SIRO’s 100% fibre-optic network. Rather than having to invest millions in building our own fibre network, we now have access to the best technology in the country, which gives us a great opportunity to attract new customers. As SIRO’s 100% fibre-optic broadband network is future proofed, it’s the only broadband service people in Athlone will ever need, a prospect I am very excited about personally as a fellow Athlone resident.”
SIRO’s 100% fibre optic network is unprecedented in Ireland. Its Fibre-to-the-Building technology, with no copper at any point to slow it down, is recognised as the gold standard for broadband connectivity internationally. For context, downloading a high definition (HD) film of 4 GB (Gigabytes) with a 10 Mbps connection takes an hour – with SIRO it takes 30 seconds.
Using the existing ESB network, SIRO delivers fibre optic cables all the way to the building. This technology, known as Fibre-to-the-Building, has no copper connections at any point to slow down the network and delivers 1 Gigabit speeds.
The SIRO network now covers 120,000 premises, with services now live or under construction in 25 towns across the country including Dundalk, Carrigaline, Sligo, Letterkenny, Tralee, Cavan, Wexford, Skibbereen, Drogheda, Mullingar, Portlaoise, Ennis, Castlebar, Westport, Limerick, Newbridge, Carlow, Swords, Balbriggan, Bray, Greystones, Athlone, Killarney, Shannon and Mallow.
SIRO is offered on an open-access basis to all telecoms retailers in Ireland, with Airwire, Vodafone, Sky, Digiweb, Carnsore Broadband, Rocket Broadband, WestNet and Kerry Broadband all already offering services, along with partnerships with enet and BT as SIRO drives competition in the wholesale broadband market.