About half of the projects aimed at bringing superfast broadband to rural areas in the UK are currently underway, following the latest contract signing between West Sussex County Council and BT, according to the UK government.
The government, which is investing £680m in the project, revealed that about 22 out of 44 schemes have moved into the delivery phase, further supporting the launch of required infrastructure to offer superfast broadband to 90% of the UK, and about 2Mbs to the remaining 10% of the population.
UK Communications Minister Ed Vaizey said the contract signing in West Sussex marks a milestone in efforts to bring superfast broadband to those areas around the UK where it is currently unavailable.
"With 50% of projects now in delivery phase, businesses and individuals will very shortly be enjoying all the benefits that high speeds offer," Vaizey said.
As per the contract, BT will offer broadband infrastructure to about 44,000 homes with superfast speeds of as a minimum 24Mbps from spring 2016.
According to Ofcom, the UK’s average downstream speed has currently reached 11.7Mbps and about 9.7% of properties in the area can access speeds less than 2Mbps.
Superfast broadband allows users to deploy use multiple applications that require high bandwidth at the same time and allow rapid and efficient sending and receiving of bulky data.
