The Super-Connected Newport project is far more ambitious than simply helping businesses to understand the benefits of superfast broadband.

At the heart of the project is the aim of brining a completely new level of service to Newport.

Ultrafast broadband is a new level of broadband service that gives small businesses the ability to compete with even the most wealthy and sophisticate large businesses.

These new broadband services offer an affordable level of internet access that has simply not been available until recently.

South Wales-based Spectrum Internet are one of the UK’s leading providers of the new breed of services.

Spectrum Internet’s managing director Giles Phelps explains. The new services bring together the latest fibre based broadband technology, with a new commercial approach. This allows several businesses to share a very high bandwidth internet connection – which makes it affordable. But because it is such a high bandwidth, individual users don’t suffer from a shared connection in the same way that they did with an old-style broadband connection.

These latest ultrafast connections allow businesses to use their internet connections for a range of different purposes at the same time, without compromising performance in any aspect. For example – holding a video conference call at the same time as emailing a large file. Old-style broadband, and even some superfast broadband services might struggle to do this well, but ultrafast broadband can do this and more.

James Saunby of GreySky Consulting, said: "Research we are undertaking on the latest types of ultrafast broadband networks shows that the best services are not simply a matter of bandwidth, but how this is managed. New ways of working will share one powerful network connection for several different applications. This can cause a conflict. Advanced fibre to the property services such as those provided by Spectrum Internet allow this approach to work really effectively.”

Although the technical capabilities of the new services are important, it is still vital that they are affordable for small businesses. Giles Phelps explains, “small businesses can save a huge amount of time and money using the new ultrafast services, and gain access to new markets, but they still have to be affordable on a small business budget. Old-style broadband doesn’t give the capability, and the private circuits used by large businesses are just not affordable. Shared ultrafast broadband services are the perfect answer – and our challenge is to find businesses that are able to share the services to make them affordable. That is where the Super-Connected Newport project is such a help. By identifying businesses that want high speed broadband, we can combine several businesses in the same area to make the service commercially viable. And by combining the connection vouchers, we can deliver sophisticated broadband services into areas that have previously been “broadband not-spots” – where the only acceptable services available were completely unaffordable to most small businesses.

Cllr Bob Bright, Leader of Newport City Council, said: "The Super-Connected Newport project gives the funding to small businesses to help them to access the most effective high speed broadband connection for their business needs. The project is supported by a wide range of service providers and we welcome the support from all of them. It is particularly encouraging to see a South Wales company taking such a technically and commercially innovative approach to supporting the needs of the small businesses in Newport.”