The Burgenland district (Saxony-Anhalt) took an important step towards broadband expansion on May 7. All of the district’s mayors, representatives of the state, the Saxony-Anhalt Investment Bank, aconium GmbH – the project sponsor of the Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure (BMVI) – and the companies involved in the expansion came together to sign the contract at the district administration in Naumburg.
District Administrator Götz Ulrich: “With today’s conclusion of the broadband expansion contracts by the cities and municipalities, the Burgenland district and the network operators, they are now in a position to commission the concrete approval planning for the broadband expansion. This provides all parties involved with the much-needed planning security for the broadband expansion project in the entire Burgenland district.” Now the detailed planning has to be carried out, which will then decide on the concrete progress of the expansion project. Construction work is due to start this year.
On March 16, the district received notification of the final amount of the grant from aconium GmbH. According to this, a good 4.3 million euros from the federal broadband funding will flow into the expansion of the district’s digital infrastructure. The state of Saxony-Anhalt is contributing a good 5.4 million euros; the district is contributing a good 1.1 million euros. More than 30,000 households and almost 2,500 companies in the region are set to benefit from the federally funded project. The aim is to achieve data transfer rates of at least 50 Mbit/s. More than 80 percent of households will be provided with network connections of at least 100 Mbit/s and over 300 companies will be equipped with bandwidths of 1 Gbit/s and higher using FTTB (fiber-to-the-building) technology.
Photo credit: aconium GmbH / Florian Schuh