Local businesses urged to join the broadband revolution

Responding to Oftel's announcement that 500,000 UK consumers now have high-speed Internet connections, the Northern Ireland Advisory Committee on Telecommunications (NIACT) has pledged to encourage local users to make use of the benefits of this service.

Broadband is a new technology to Northern Ireland and uptake has been slow due to lack of awareness of what the product is and the benefits available for both residential and business consumers.

In essence, a broadband service ensures the user is always "connected" to the Internet, and can download and send information many times faster than a normal connection. The potential benefits of this to business consumers in Northern Ireland include the opportunity for online transactions to be processed at increased speeds, vastly increasing profitability. Large data files can be also be sent and received more swiftly – including information such as architecture designs - opening up small-sized local businesses to a global market.

The Department of Enterprise Trade and Investment are currently promoting the broadband issue, but there is still some way to go before awareness is sufficiently raised regarding the matter.

Encouraging consumers to take up broadband, Caroline Mulvenna, NIACT Manager, commented: "NIACT wish to see more consumers taking up broadband and once they see the advantages of this they will not be disappointed.

"NIACT are going to be promoting broadband throughout the year by introducing the technology and explaining the advantages to local businesses and councillors and we would be interested in hearing what consumers concerns and needs are in order for us to address the issue fully".

(CL)