Broadband growth 'ahead of forecast'

The number of broadband lines in the UK is growing ahead of forecast, according to analysts at Point Topic. There were more than 16,735,000 broadband lines at the end of June, 225,000 ahead of the company’s estimates. "The number of dial-up homes ripe for migration to broadband is rapidly dwindling, there are barely a million of them left now and they are an increasingly resistant minority," said Tim Johnson, chief analyst at Point Topic. However, Point Topic said that ISPs were only making slow progress in winning over the 9.6 million UK households that have no internet access at all. But overall, the broadband market is performing especially well considering the state of the economy, according to the company, meaning that ISPs with dwindling customer numbers only had themselves to blame. "It is understandable that an ISP's chief executive should blame his shrinking broadband numbers on the economy rather than lack of foresight or declining market share. But it gives a misleading impression of how well the broadband business is doing," said Johnson. www.point-topic.com