South African telecoms provider Vodacom has revealed plans to deploy fiber-to-the-building (FTTB) technology, offering maximum download speeds of 100Mbps to selected small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in Cape Town, Durban and Gauteng, TechCentral reports. Vodacom Business disclosed that the service, dubbed Broadband Connect Fibre, will use the latest passive optical network (PON) technology, with subscription plans starting at ZAR2,599 (USD235.49) for a 5Mbps/2.5Mbps downlink/uplink connection, while a premium 100Mbps/50Mbps access would be priced at ZAR16,999. SMEs will get uncapped broadband access, a router and optional voice-over-internet protocol (VoIP) service, with the initial set-up fee of ZAR899 to be waived during the launch phase (until 31 March 2015).

Vodacom Business CEO Vuyani Jarana said: ‘We have invested billions of rand in building our fibre-optic network, meaning that we now have the critical mass to offer customers across South Africa access to the latest technology including FTTB… With this new service, businesses will be able to access rich content experiences via the internet that were previously only available to large corporate customers.’