Survey claims lack of fibre broadband affecting WAN performance

Lack of fibre optic broadband availability is having a negative impact on the performance of wide area networks (WANs), according to a new survey from Computing.

Of 120 IT professionals quizzed by the magazine, 38 per cent cited the speed of data throughput as an issue affecting the WAN used by their organisation.

The findings were presented during a webinar hosted in association with broadband provider Eclipse Internet.

Andrew Saunders, the internet service provider's Head of Product, said local broadband technologies are struggling to keep pace with the increase in capacity required by businesses.

Demand for bandwidth is growing by around a fifth year on year, he explained, as organisations make greater use of data and applications.

"The challenge is at the customers' sites, especially at the mid to small sites where fibre broadband isn't available and regular broadband isn't providing enough speed," Mr Saunders added.

According to Ofcom's latest figures, there are 3.8 million super-fast broadband users in the UK and the country's average broadband speed is 12Mbps.