BT fibre broadband customer base grows to 1.5m properties

BT has seen demand for fibre optic broadband accelerate throughout the 2012-13 financial year, with hundreds of thousands of customers now signed up for the service.

In its results for the quarter and year to March 31st, the telecoms giant revealed that more than 1.5 million homes and businesses are using its super-fast broadband products, with 873,000 of these subscribing over the past 12 months.

The company's plan to roll out the technology to two-thirds of UK properties is also proceeding apace, with the network now passing 15 million premises - up by around 6.2 million in the year.

Discussing its outlook for 2013-14, BT promised that it will continue to invest "extensively" in fibre optic broadband.

The company will no doubt hope the decision to offer its new sports channels free to all of its broadband customers will help to drive further uptake of its super-fast Infinity services.

Set to launch this summer, BT Sport has won the live rights to Barclays Premier League football, Aviva Premiership rugby union and more.