Joint Venture to bring affordable wireless broadband to all

Manchester City Council is seeking a joint venture partner to extend its award-winning Eastserve wireless broadband service across the city.

This is part of the city's new Digital Strategy for Manchester which aims to ensure that all residents have access to "universal, affordable next generation broadband access" which it says "is essential to connect all residents and businesses of the Manchester City-region to the social, educational, informational and economic opportunities they deserve."

The Eastserve project was set up in 2000 to bridge the digital divide in East Manchester by improving access to information and communication technology (ICT) for local residents. In 2003 the project developed a community wireless broadband internet network in response to the fact that according to the survey undertaken in 2001 a quarter of local residents reported not having a telephone landline, a figure that we believe has risen to above 50 per cent. With very little of the area cabled it meant a significant proportion of residents could not access the internet at home. The wireless network was the first of its kind in the country and more than 1,000 people were connected paying from as little as £6 per month for always on broadband access.

With the expansion of the New East Manchester (NEM) area in 2004, a further phase of the Eastserve project was rolled out to the wider NEM area in 2005. As a result of this more than 5,500 East Manchester residents received subsidised PCs and training and more than 3,500 connected to the wireless network.

The impact of this initiative has been extensive, as documented in the most recent evaluation report:

• More than 12,500 enquiries since 2004 to the Eastserve Interactive Jobs Database, rising from 300 per month in early 2005 to a current level of around 1,000 per month.
• During 2004 more than 16 per cent of respondents to the database gained employment and another eight per cent were helped to source job applications.
• Following the introductory training, 62 per cent of respondents went on to undertake further training and 44% of these obtained a recognised qualification.
• Over 650 reports in the last nine months to Eastserve's Anonymous Crime Reporting service.

Now the City Council has launched a tender process to seek a joint venture partner to enhance the existing Eastserve service and to extend this across all of the other regeneration areas eventually providing city-wide coverage.

Eddie Smith, Chief executive of NEM said: "This is a fantastic opportunity for a new public-private partnership to be created to make Eastserve even better and extend both its range of services and its coverage. Residents of East Manchester can look forward to remaining some of the best connected in the country. We think that this will bring real benefits in terms of new skills, employment opportunities and services."

Sir Richard Leese, Leader of Manchester City Council, said: "I very much welcome this new development. Manchester has a very strong track record of putting together imaginative partnerships with the private sector and then using these to bring real local benefits to residents and businesses across the city. This proposed joint venture will help to make Manchester a world-class digital city and help to ensure that all our residents can benefit from the opportunities being created by the digital world."

For more information about Manchester's Digital Strategy visit www.manchesterdda.com

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Roger Williams, Press Office, tel: 0161 234 3275