Thousands of entrepreneurs in Scotland are in line to get faster internet speeds. Up to 1,850 businesses in multi-tenanted buildings in Glasgow postcodes G1 and G2 will benefit while an additional 7,500 small businesses in the centre of the city will receive local upgrades through dedicated connections, offering speeds up to 1Gb.
The programme is part of Virgin Media Business’s commitment to help business take advantage of the UK’s £92bn ‘Digital Opportunity’ – a study by Oxford Economics that found the UK could generate more than a million jobs in two years, if digital technologies were deployed to their full advantage.
Digital technologies were found to contribute £10.3bn a year to the Scottish economy, with businesses predicting 101,000 new digital jobs are likely to be created over two years. In addition, a further £10.7bn could be generated every year if the Scottish economy became even more digital.
Peter Kelly, Managing Director, Virgin Media Business, said: “We know there’s a link between how digitally ambitious a business is and its success, but you can’t be digitally ambitious if you don’t have an ultrafast connection to the internet. The upgrade in Glasgow means thousands more companies can now meet their full digital potential, and we’re very excited about that. We expect this to have a direct impact on the city’s economy in the coming years. We know we’ll see thousands of our customers VOOM.”
Kim Wilson, managing director of 200 SVS Ltd, said: “From fledgling to fast growth clients, requirements differ from one tenant to another. We may be renting out serviced office space to a small group of three, or a full floor to a hundred employees, so a scalable solution is important. Whatever their individual circumstances, the IT requirement is vital and it’s always one of the first questions we’re asked. Our clients require a dedicated connection into their own space with the flexibility to scale up as their business requires it, which we can now offer.”
Andy Watson, Co-Founder and Director, Red Paint Multimedia, said: “Our previous internet connection was really holding us back. Due to the efficiencies we’ve been able to drive with Virgin Media Business, our developers are each gaining an extra hour per day, and because we’re no longer paying for two lines, we’re actually spending less money. This has all been possible after the phenomenal jump in speed.”
