Manchester’s digital industry is booming and with a robust IT and telecommunications infrastructure, the city region is digitally connected for business.
Being at a central UK location, all primary telecom carriers and fibre networks converge through Manchester. This makes it a principal access point for the North of England, capable of supplying all the networking and IT resources needed to succeed globally in business.
The UK’s second internet hub
MaNAP – Manchester Network Access Point – is a major internet traffic hub that serves the UK’s access to worldwide networks. MaNAP is a membership-owned organisation, established in 1997 to enable internet companies in the North and Midlands to interconnect without the massive cost of running circuits to London and back, making them more competitive.
It is one of Europe’s most mature internet exchanges and allows Internet Service Providers, telecoms companies, carriers, content and web hosting providers to make financial savings by directly connecting to each other. Current members include BT, Telewest Broadband, NTL Group and Kingston Communications, with the list continuing to grow.
Local Communications Networks
Full networking capability is available throughout the city centre and at all employment locations within the conurbation. Services are delivered by a wide range of providers ensuring competitive costs. The choice of carriers available to businesses in Manchester’s key locations includes BT, NTL, Energis, Your Communications and Telewest.
Manchester is also a hub of broadband services for business and Manchester companies are deeply involved in rapidly developing new channels to market.
Being at the northern point of all of the UK’s fibre rings, Manchester has access to a wide range of internet transit and upstream bandwidth providers. The city’s suitability as a destination for high speed voice and data traffic is strengthened by the arrival of a direct transatlantic link into the region at Southport.
WiFi
The cloud, Europe’s leading wireless broadband network operator, launched free WiFi internet access to ‘hotzones’ across the city in early 2006. The Manchester WiFi hotzones turn broadband-speed internet into radio signals which can then be accessed by laptops, PDAs, handheld games consoles and WiFi-enabled mobile phones to allow quick, free and easy internet access.
To find out more about Manchester’s digital infrastructure, please contact MIDAS.
