Projects
Active Projects
5G Innovation Region: England’s Connected Heartland (ECH)
Oxfordshire County Council is leading a 5G Innovation Region to drive adoption of 5G technology which will in turn lead to greater private sector investment in these important new advanced wireless technologies. The council led a joint funding bid on behalf of nine other councils – Buckinghamshire, all Berkshire’s unitary authorities, Central Bedfordshire, and Cambridgeshire – and will now work closely with them on a 5G project called England’s Connected Heartland.
Find out more about England’s Connected Heartland
Smart Infrastructure Pilots Programme (SIPP) and Smart City
The Digital Infrastructure and Innovation teams at Oxfordshire County Council will purchase c 15 smart, multi-purpose lighting columns (PAS 191 standard) which will be installed in Oxford for mobile and wireless connectivity services. The plan is for the columns to provide a ‘connected corridor’ from the revamped Oxford train station up to the city centre, which will provide opportunities for tourism, transport, local commerce, education, and other use-cases. If successful, the connected corridor would be extended to cover additional strategically important routes across the city.
Find out more about SIPP
GigaHubs
Oxfordshire County Council has worked with Neos Networks to connect schools, GP Practices, Fire Stations, Libraries, Leisure Centres, Community Centres, Village Halls and Museums with full fibre broadband.
Find out more about GigaHubs
Small Cells
Small Cells can be fitted onto existing street infrastructure such as lighting columns, so our Digital Infrastructure Programme team has been working on projects to roll out Small Cells in Oxford.
Find out more about Small Cells
Project Gigabit
Project Gigabit is a Building Digital UK (BDUK) managed project, with the aim of delivering gigabit-capable broadband infrastructure to approximately 10,000 premises in Oxfordshire. The project uses a gap funding model to allow state aid intervention to support supplier investment in locations of market failure.
Find out more about Project Gigabit
Past Projects
Better Broadband for Oxfordshire (BBFO)
The Better Broadband for Oxfordshire (BBFO) programme enabled over 97,000 premises to receive access to Superfast Broadband. Among these premises, the programme has brought this connectivity to over 100 churches, 120+ schools, 170+ village halls and 190+ farms, plus many more. The project also built 748 fibre structures and extended the fibre footprint in Oxfordshire by 641km, which has made the rollout of full fibre networks more viable in the county.
Find out more about BBFO
Businesses in Rural Oxfordshire (BiRO)
This project was funded by a grant of £4.8m from the European Agriculture Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD) and aimed to improve rural business productivity by providing full fibre infrastructure to hard-to-reach rural businesses in the county. Following a procurement through the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU), BT and Airband were awarded contracts to collectively deliver full-fibre broadband to businesses in the most rural parts of the county. Works began in 2019 and completed in August 2022, with 777 businesses delivered and a further 818 residential properties also connected.
Find out more about BiRO
Gigabit Broadband Voucher Scheme
The Digital Infrastructure programme team is supporting the Government’s Gigabit Broadband Voucher Scheme, voucher funding that provides immediate help for people experiencing slow broadband speeds in rural areas. Vouchers worth up to £4,500 for homes and businesses help to cover the costs of installing gigabit broadband to people’s doorsteps.
