Google planning own fibre-optic network
Fed up with government stalling, goes it alone
Google has announced it will begin to trial its own fibre optic broadband network as it seeks to improve internet speeds.
The trials will begin in a number of locations across the US and will mean speeds of over 1Gbps.
Google says it hopes to offer the service to up to 500,000 people initially, and it will use the service to actually find out what it can do with next-generation internet speeds.
The search giant wants to see whether it can develop some 'killer apps' using the new huge amounts of bandwidth, as well as the best ways to develop and implement these new networks.
Google has pledged to share any learnings with other providers, as well as opening up the network so users can choose their service providers.
Share and share alike
It seems Google is keen to get this network up and running, and so far it hasn't met with the right response from the US authorities:
Sign up for breaking news, reviews, opinion, top tech deals, and more.
"We've urged the FCC to look at new and creative ways to get there in its National Broadband Plan – and today we're announcing an experiment of our own.
"We're planning to build and test ultra high-speed broadband networks in a small number of trial locations across the United States.
"We'll deliver internet speeds more than 100 times faster than what most Americans have access to today with 1 gigabit per second, fibre-to-the-home connections."
We're not sure whether the UK will benefit from such 'benevolence', but it's clear Google wants to roll out some bandwidth-intensive services - and we should hopefully benefit from whatever that is.
Gareth has been part of the consumer technology world in a career spanning three decades. He started life as a staff writer on the fledgling TechRadar, and has grew with the site (primarily as phones, tablets and wearables editor) until becoming Global Editor in Chief in 2018. Gareth has written over 4,000 articles for TechRadar, has contributed expert insight to a number of other publications, chaired panels on zeitgeist technologies, presented at the Gadget Show Live as well as representing the brand on TV and radio for multiple channels including Sky, BBC, ITV and Al-Jazeera. Passionate about fitness, he can bore anyone rigid about stress management, sleep tracking, heart rate variance as well as bemoaning something about the latest iPhone, Galaxy or OLED TV.