Tech
Openreach UK broadband upgrade reaches 20 million homes | Computer Weekly
In what its CEO describes as a UK infrastructure success story that is a credit to the investment, hard work and ambition of everyone at the BT-owned broadband provision company, Openreach has revealed that its current infrastructure programme has now hit a major milestone, with 20 million homes and businesses now able to access its full-fibre broadband network.
In a geographic and lyrical flourish, Openreach said its network now reaches from “the beautiful, windswept Fair Isle in Scotland’s far north to the far reaches of Devon and Cornwall in England’s South West”, its engineers having laid full-fibre cables in cities, towns and villages throughout the UK.
Ultimately, and assuming that it can take advantage of the right economic and regulatory conditions, Openreach hopes to make its full-fibre network available to as many as 30 million premises in all corners of the UK by the end of the decade. It says full-fibre infrastructure is already becoming the backbone of Britain’s digital economy, supporting everything from smart farming and sustainable transport to remote working and virtual healthcare.
Openreach describes its build-out project as one of the largest and fastest broadband infrastructure programmes in Europe, with engineers now reaching more than a million new homes every three months. It has so far included around 33,000 medical facilities and more than 25,000 colleges, schools and universities, helping to “transform” access to critical services.
Openreach claims to be building its new network to connect customers faster and further than any other provider in the UK, reaching an average of 85,000 new premises every week. In total, more than 3,500 UK towns, cities, boroughs, villages and hamlets have so far been included in the build programme, with others being reached through publicly funded partnerships.
As an indication of the progress of the build-out, on 1 July 2025, Openreach reported that 19 million premises across the UK could then order its gigabit broadband technology and that it was on track to reach five million more homes and businesses with its broadband network during the year to March 2026.
It added that seven million UK premises were already taking services based on its network via a host of popular providers – 37% of the full footprint. Yet Openreach noted that, at present, only around 38% of households that could order full-fibre from Openreach have made the switch.
For Openreach chief executive Clive Selley, reaching 20 million premises represents a UK infrastructure success story, but he stressed that the job in hand was not done yet, especially given that the next premises to connect were some of the very hardest to reach.
“In 2025, being online isn’t a luxury – it’s a lifeline. From booking GP appointments to applying for jobs, accessing education and launching businesses, digital connectivity is the gateway to opportunity. Full-fibre makes that gateway faster and far more reliable, and it will keep up with the demands of our digital world,” he said.
“But upgrades don’t often happen automatically, so people need to contact their broadband provider to make the switch. To finish the job, we need the right support as an industry, including targeted help for some rural areas, faster planning approvals, better access to multi-dwelling buildings, and a regulatory and policy environment that gives investors confidence and allows competition to thrive.”
When Google’s self-driving car project began testing in the Bay Area back in 2009, its engineers focused on highways by sending its sensor-laden vehicles cruising down Interstate 280, which runs the length of Silicon Valley’s peninsula.
More than 15 years later, the cars are back on the freeway—this time without drivers. On Tuesday, the project, now an Alphabet subsidiary we all know as Waymo, announced that its robotaxi service would now drive on freeways in the San Francisco Bay Area, Los Angeles, and Phoenix.
The new service marks another technical leap for Waymo, whose robotaxis currently serve five US metros: Atlanta, Austin, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and the San Francisco Bay Area. The company says it will launch in several other US and international cities next year, including Dallas, Miami, Nashville, Las Vegas, Detroit, and London.
Waymo also announced Wednesday that it would begin curbside pickup and drop-off service at San Jose Mineta International Airport, allowing passengers to, theoretically, travel autonomously all the way from San Francisco to San Jose—a service area of some 260 square miles. Waymo has been offering its autonomous taxi service on area service roads since the summer of 2023, but the new freeway service could cut in half the time it takes for a robotaxi to travel from San Francisco to Mountain View, Waymo user experience researcher Naomi Guthrie says.
“Freeway driving is one of those things that’s very easy to learn, but very hard to master,” Waymo co-CEO Dmitri Dolgov told reporters last week. Highways are predictable, with (mostly) clear signs and lane lines, and a limited set of vehicles and players (trucks, cars, motorcycles, trailers) that a vehicle’s software must learn to recognize and predict. But Waymo executives said that, despite a year of employee- and guest-only highway testing, safety emergencies on highways are relatively rare, so the team was unable to collect as much real-world data as it needed to train its vehicles to operate safely there. Complicating the project was the fact that highway crashes, at high speeds, are subject to the laws of phsyics—and so more likely to maim or kill.
To get ready for highways, Waymo executives say, engineers supplemented real-world driving data and training with data collected on private, closed courses, and data created in simulations. Two onboard computers help create system “redundancies,” meaning the vehicles will have computer backup if something goes wrong. The vehicles have been trained to exit highways in the case of emergencies, but will be able to pull over as well. Waymo execs also say they have and will work with law enforcement and first responders, including highway patrols, to create procedures for vehicles and riders stranded on highway shoulders, where hundreds of Americans are killed every year.
Product highlight: the new Sedomat 6010 Controller
At their booth Sedo Treepoint will display the new Sedomat 6010 controller, a cost-effective yet powerful addition to the successful current Sedomat 6000/8000 Series. Compact, modular and designed for seamless integration, the new Series brings premium automation capabilities to a wider range of applications
At ITMA ASIA 2025 (Hall 8, Booth B410), Sedo Treepoint will showcase its latest textile automation and digitalisation solutions under the theme ‘Textile solutions together.’
Highlights include the new Sedomat 6010 Controller, MES expert systems, cloud-based Connect, and ColorMasterConnect, driving efficiency, sustainability, and quality in textile production.
Digital connectivity with MES and web-based solutions
Besides hardware, Sedo Treepoint will present its MES expert systems SedoMaster, SedoExpert and EnergyMaster, enabling real-time data exchange, centralized planning and connectivity across machines, ERP systems and chemical dosing units. Key features such as automatic production planning (APS) and process-wide optimizations help enhance efficiency and overall production performance.
With Connect, Sedo Treepoint introduces a new cloud-based solution for the entire textile industry. Designed to go beyond dyeing and finishing, Connect enables manufacturers across all textile sectors to benefit from centralized data access, real-time insights and scalable digital infrastructure without heavy upfront investment.
Alongside this, ColorMasterConnect will be presented as a web-based application. It provides intuitive, device-independent tools for color management, ensuring flexible, agile and accurate processes in production.
Innovation with purpose
“Automation and AI are powerful when combined with human expertise,” says Werner Volkaert, CEO of Sedo Treepoint. That’s why Sedo Treepoints solutions are designed to combine intelligent automation with deep industry expertise, delivering real value where it matters most. Helping manufacturers this way using resources efficiently, safely and consistently, is the main impact for ensuring higher quality, shorter lead times and long-term competitiveness.
Discover the future of textile automation
Visit Sedo Treepoint and their partner Smart Indigo at Hall 8, Booth B410, to experience the Sedomat 6010 Controller and new solutions like Connect and ColorMasterConnect. Discover how these innovations help textile manufacturers optimize production, reduce lead times and achieve consistent, high-quality results.
Click here to know more about ITMA Asia + CITME, Singapore 2025.
Note: The headline, insights, and image of this press release may have been refined by the Fibre2Fashion staff; the rest of the content remains unchanged.
Fibre2Fashion News Desk (HU)
Apparently, it’s always Friday at the Home Depot. Or at least, the Home Depot Black Friday deals have slipped all customary bounds of the calendar: Online deals started November 5 and will go all the way to December 3.
This includes some very steep discounts on flagship tool brands like Milwaukee, Ryobi, and DeWalt tools—by which I mean half-off and buy-one-get-one steep. Seemingly half the store is on sale. But here’s an early look at some of the best deals to look out for as Black Friday rings in early.
Discounts on Google Nest and Other Smart Home Devices
A couple of WIRED’s top-tested smart home devices from Google Nest have significant discounts at Home Depot right now, alongside discounts on a mess of smart home devices from Echo, Eufy, and others.
The newest Nest Learning Thermostat is a genuine blockbuster device in its category, and the Home Depot is selling it for the lowest price I can find at any retailer right now. The Nest is pretty on the eyes and has no trouble with disconnections or irregularities in the temperature readout, which are surprisingly common among smart home thermostats. It also offers a bunch of fun features, including a readout that changes depending on your proximity to the device. Even better, the Nest thermostat comes with an external temperature sensor that lets you prioritize the readings in a specific room (or part of a room). This allowed WIRED reviewer Nena Farrell to tune the device to her toddler’s bedroom to keep it from getting too stuffy. The larger screen size is also a noticeable upgrade from previous generations, she noted.
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Photograph: Simon Hill
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Photograph: Simon Hill
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Photograph: Simon Hill
Nest Cam Outdoor 2K (Wired, 2nd Gen)
The Nest Cam Outdoor 2K requires a little installation, sure: You’ll need to screw in the mount and run a cable. But the cam offers 2K video quality and two-way audio, and doesn’t waste your time with a string of ambiguous notifications like a lot of outdoor cameras: It can accurately detect people, animals, and vehicles. The camera offers sharp video with a 152-degree field of view. It’s the wired outdoor cam that WIRED reviewer Simon Hill recommends above all others—but note that while notifications and live feed don’t require a subscription, you’ll need a $10- or $20-a-month subscription to access more advanced features that include detection of Familiar Faces and 30 to 60 days of video history. Anyway, it’s 20 percent off for Black Friday at the Home Depot, alongside sales on a whole host of other smart home devices.
Buy-One-Get-One Deals on DeWalt Tools
A few tools from home improvement staple DeWalt are on sale for buy-one-get-one at the moment. It’s a bit tough to sort out on the Home Depot’s site, but essentially you’ve got a mix and match of a few select DeWalt tools.
Buy one, and any of the other tools is free. This includes the 13-Inch Cordless String Trimmer ($139), the 20V Cordless Leaf Blower ($179), the 20V MAX XR Cordless Brushless Jigsaw ($239), and the 20V MAX Cordless Brushless Circular Saw ($229)
Aside from that BOGO deal, you can get a free DeWalt tool with the purchase of a battery, or a free DeWalt battery with the purchase of a tool, as detailed here. Or, kinda most of the rest of the DeWalt toolkit is on sale this month for somewhere between 20 percent and 50 percent off. It’s not the steepest discount on the list, but might I suggest WIRED’s absolute favorite drill and driver kit, on sale now for $50 off?
Photograph: Home Depot
DeWalt
20V Max 1/2-Inch Cordless Drill
The Home Depot Milwaukee Tools for 50 Percent Off
During the Home Depot’s month-long Black Friday sale, you can also opt to go with buy-one-get-one or 50-percent-off deals on a number of Milwaukee tools. WIRED Reviewer Scott Gilbertson is already on record as loving the Milwaukee Tool ecosystem as a smart investment—to make use of Milwaukee’s excellent battery tech. He now owns dozens, from impact guns to circular saws and a drywall screw gun.
Anyway, the most essential tool in the kit, Milwaukee’s M18 Fuel Brushless Cordless Hex Impact Driver ($179), is on a buy-one-get-one sale alongside other select Milwaukee tools as part of a buy-one-get-one deal that also includes Milwaukee’s brushless cordless grinder ($229) and cordless personal inflator ($199). Other tools include free batteries with select tools, or vice versa.
It’s not always easy when browsing the general site to see which tools are on the BOGO deal, but click the button below and take note of the tools marked “Free With Purchase.”
Buy-One-Get-One Makita, Ryobi, and Ridgid Tools
Once you’ve bought into a tool ecosystem, it’s kinda part of your life now: You’ve chosen a battery pack that will power a whole world of powered implements. Different WIRED staffers have their own preferences. For WIRED reviewers Julian Chokkattu and Pete Cottell both, their personal world is Makita. And Makita is one of the brands with a killer buy-one-get-one at the moment: Just buy one of the Makita tools here and you can select either a free battery pack, or a freebie among seven other Makita tools in the $200 range.
WIRED has not tested all these tools, but Ryobi has a similar deal, on its affordable tool sets, with a BOGO deal on multiple tools and batteries, including an 18-volt, oscillating, sanding, and cutting multitool ($79) for wall and panel work, and an impact wrench ($99).
Ridgid has a similar deal, with a different product set. Ridgid tool bundles with batteries are up to 60 percent off, especially a cordless blower deal with a battery starter kit for more than half off.
Ridgid
18V Brushless Cordless Battery Leaf Blower with Battery and Charger
Free Christmas Tree Delivery
I remember two things about Christmas-tree shopping as a kid, which was always the best and the worst day. Picking out the tree was, of course, plenty exciting. But then you had to load it. And you had to move it, after wrangling it into a pickup truck. Then you had to unload it, and get it into the house. By the time you’re clear of all that, you might as well just forget Christmas spirit.
Well, the internet is a many-splendored thing. The Home Depot is offering free delivery on Christmas trees during Black Friday, on anything from artificial trees (here’s the best-seller right now) to fresh-cut fir, which is already coming into stock but only from online-only vendors. (Or, if you’d rather, check out WIRED’s roundup of the best artificial Christmas trees, as tested by professionals.
Artificial trees or real ones show up at your doorstep at no additional charge, no pickup truck required. Because we already live in the future.
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