Digital Region

Two High-Profile Figures See Beginning of the Digital Revolution in Barnsley

Two important events which signify the arrival of the digital age in Barnsley take place later this month.

Business leaders from South Yorkshire and Paris will discuss how they can benefit from digital investment at a launch event at Barnsley Digital Media Centre on Thursday, 22 October. And on Friday, 23rd the government’s new Digital Inclusion Champion, Martha Lane Fox, will meet local IT learners and hear their stories as Barnsley hosts national Get Online Day.

Barnsley launch of Digital Region, 22 October: Digital Media Centre, 10am

Barnsley is at the heart of a new superfast broadband network which will cover 97 per cent of South Yorkshire’s domestic and business properties and put the sub-region at the forefront of digital technologies. A 25 Mbit/s Fibre to the Cabinet network will be become available in some areas from the end of the year, eventually reaching 1.3 million people in Barnsley, Doncaster, Rotherham and Sheffield. The high-speed service is seen as vital to developing the region's economy.

The network is being built by Digital Region in partnership with technology company Thales UK, and will offer bandwidth speeds of 25Mbit/s along with very high bandwidth upload speeds. Businesses will be able to increase their competitiveness and develop new products. The Digital Region network will also attract inward investment and enable the delivery of more effective public services. Digital Region is wholly owned by Yorkshire Forward and the four local authorities of South Yorkshire who together attracted European, regional, local and private investment of over £90 million, including £30 million from the European Regional Development Fund. Thales UK will be responsible for building, managing and developing the network. Building work began recently and with a phased implementation programme will be completed in 2012. Once in place the network will bring broadband service to 550,000 homes, 40,000 businesses and 1.3 million people.

Information and technology company Bull Information Services has invested in a state-of-the-art data centre in Barnsley on Pontefract Road. The data centre is a key investment by the giant French IT international group Groupe Bull as part of its innovative partnership with Barnsley Council. The partnering arrangement with Bull Information Services provides ICT services to the council and the new data centre is part of the development plans because it sees the exciting business opportunities being created as the borough embraces digital technology.

Didier Lamouche, who is the chairman and chief executive of Groupe Bull, will travel from Paris to open the new data centre and address delegates at the Digital Media Centre on Thursday, 22 October as the cornerstone of the launch event which begins at 10am. Journalists are invited to attend.

Martha Lane Fox, national Get online day, 23 October: Royston Community Learning Centre (am); Barnsley Central Library (pm)

Barnsley has set itself the ambitious target of getting everyone in the borough online and able to use computers by 2012. This project, Totally Online Barnsley, has already received substantial attention via broadcast and new media.

Dot-com millionaire and leisure website lastminute co-founder Martha Lane Fox chairs the new government’s Digital Inclusion Taskforce, of which Barnsley Council chief executive Phil Coppard and Helen Milner, Managing Director if UK Online Centres are 2 of the 10 expert advisers. The brief of the taskforce is to represent six million adults who are both socially and digitally excluded. The focus of digital inclusion is to make the best use of digital technology to improve the lives of people, particularly the most disadvantaged, and the places in which they live.

Visiting Barnsley, Martha Lane Fox will meet people who are learning to use various aspects of digital technology at both work and at home. Barnsley is playing host to the official Get online day flagship event, split across two UK online centre venues – the Royston Community Learning Centre in the morning, and Barnsley Central Library in the afternoon.

They’ll be leading the way for more than 700 other Get online day events taking place at UK online centres nation-wide.