Govt announces plans to 'make broadband 100 times faster'

Broadband internet access in the UK could be made 100 times faster, if a new government project is successful.

The £7.2 million Photonics HyperHighway project, funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), will bring together scientists to look at how fibre-optic technology is used.

Announcing the launch of the scheme at the University of Southampton, where much of the research will be undertaken, minister for universities and science David Willetts explained it is in the country's interest to provide all the support it can to the £100 billion internet industry.

Project leader and professor at the University of Southampton David Payne said: “Now is the time to look ahead to develop the UK infrastructure of the future. Our ambition is nothing less than to rebuild the internet hardware to suit it to the needs of 21st-century Britain."

One of the key aims of the study is to radically transform the physical nature of the digital infrastructure in the UK to give maximum support to technologies such as internet television and cloud computing, he added.

Chief executive officer at ThinkGrid Rob Lovell recently predicted a surge in demand for cloud computing solutions in 2011.