Welsh schoolgirl to make first call on BT's 21CN today

gallery

BT today announced that it has successfully started transferring users in South Wales across to its 21st century network (21CN), with plans to migrate 350,000 customer lines in the area by summer next year.

People living in Wick, a village near Cardiff, are the first to have their lines connected to the new infrastructure and, according to reports, an 11-year-old local schoolgirl will make the first phone call using the new network this morning.

Businesses and consumers living in Cardiff, Bridgend and Pontypridd will be the next targets for the upgrade which, when completed, promises to deliver new and existing converged communications services quickly and cost effectively.

To support its 21CN ambitions, BT has laid more than 2,300 kilometres of fibre optic cable in South Wales. In addition, the telco has also rebuilt 10 per cent of the UK's core communications infrastructure and installed new 21CN-enabled equipment at 100 sites country-wide.

The telecommunications giant claims that the upgrade in Wick took place without the intervention of an onsite engineer, helping to highlight what it views as a landmark event in its 21CN programme.

"Today marks a symbolic and momentous occasion for BT, the communications industry and for the UK as 21CN, over three years in the making, starts to become real for customers," said Paul Reynolds, chief executive of BT Wholesale and BT board sponsor for the 21CN programme.

"Alexander Graham Bell made the first telephone call 130 years ago - we are also making history with the first live UK customer calls using a carrier class, all IP network. Years of research and development, network build and design, rigorous trials and testing, together with open collaboration with the communications industry have culminated in this historic moment. A network transformation on this scale has not been attempted anywhere else in the world - it's happening now in South Wales, and the rest of the UK will follow over the next few years."

Email to a friend

Print this page