CityFibre, the UK’s third national digital infrastructure platform, has announced a GBP1.5 billion (US$1.97 billion) investment, awarding construction contracts for full fiber rollouts across 27 towns and cities, addressing approximately up to 3 million premises.

The awards will create over 3,750 new local network construction jobs across the UK. These form part of CityFibre’s previously announced recruitment and training program, through which it expects to create up to 10,000 network construction jobs over the next three years to support its national rollout.

The conclusion of the first phase of its Accelerated Tender Awards Programme (ATAP) brings CityFibre’s total build contracts to up to GBP2.5 billion (US$3.29 billion). With 26 build partners now under contract, its construction supply chain is secured for rollouts targeting more than 5 million premises across 66 towns and cities. Mobilization of its new partners and projects is already underway, and all projects are scheduled to be in the build by summer 2021.

Before the end of the year, CityFibre will launch the second phase of the ATAP through which it will award build contracts for up to a further 3 million premises. This will commit construction resource across the entirety of its up to 8 million Gigabit City Investment Programme target, which it is on track to have substantially completed by 2025 in support of the Government’s target for national coverage.

The rapid scaling of CityFibre’s rollout is being supported by Bechtel, one of the world’s leading engineering, construction, and project management companies. Bechtel was recently appointed to accelerate the mobilization of CityFibre’s construction partners and to maximize the productivity of each rollout project.