Virgin Media Business have announced that they are offering a broadband package to SMEs that that gives broadband speeds that are more than four times faster than the equivalent speeds offered by its rivals.

Voom Gloom For Rivals

From 2nd May, the new fibre broadband called Voom Fibre, will offer SMEs the chance to benefit from a broadband speed of 350Mbps. In reality, although many of Virgin’s customers will be able to access the full 350Mbps, most customers will get the benefit of at least 200Mbps.

Nevertheless, this appears to compare very favourably with the top broadband speed of 76Mbps offered by rivals BT, Sky and TalkTalk (where customers are in areas where those speeds are possible).

Three Price Plans + Bolt-On Services

Voom Fibre customers can choose from 3 packages with different upload speeds:

  • A £30 per month package with upload speeds of 7Mbps (which can be increased to…)
  • A £40 per month package with upload speeds of 15Mbps
  • A £50 per month package with upload speeds of 20Mbps.

Vital Says MD

Peter Kelly, the managing director of Virgin Media Business has said that offering SMEs access to this kind of broadband speed removes a long-standing barrier, and enables them to be more able to compete effectively in “this evolving digital economy”.

Mr Kelly also pitched the introduction of the service as “a huge challenge to the market to do better”, and urged competitors to try and match the speed of Virgin’s offering to help small businesses, and therefore the wider UK economy.

Help The Economy?

FSB figures show that 99% of all 5.5. million UK private sector businesses (2016 figures) could be described as SMEs. Virgin’s own commissioned research showed that if the UK’s digital potential was fulfilled (which includes faster broadband services) the UK’s GDP could increase by more than £90bn in GDP over two years.

More Bad News For Broadband Competitors

The introduction of Voom is one part of a series of announcements that are likely to have been bad news to competitors. Last month Virgin announced that its standard basic broadband speed offering would be 100Mbps (up from 50Mbps). Virgin announced that it was opening up its top-tier 300Mbps service.

What Does This Mean For Your Business?

If you are an SME and if you are in an area where it is possible to get the full benefits of Voom, this is likely to be very good news, and may even tempt you to switch from your existing provider. Fast broadband speeds can save time, and open up new possibilities for small businesses which could translate into sources of competitive advantage.