Every growing business reaches a point where poor connectivity stops being an irritation and becomes a constraint. It slows down work, limits what teams can do, narrows the choice of premises and makes future plans harder to deliver.
For a capital city supporting ambitious SMEs, attracting larger employers and building strength in growth sectors such as fintech, media, technology and life sciences, that is not a small issue. It is one of the foundations on which modern business growth now depends.
That is why Cardiff’s hypercity network is game-changing. The phrase ‘hypercity’ can sound futuristic, but the concept is straightforward. A hypercity is a city designed around ultra-high-speed connectivity, and in Cardiff that means 174 kilometres of new fibre installed across the city by Elevate in conjunction with Cardiff Council. The network gives Cardiff its own independent, state-of-the-art, 10 Gbps capable fibre infrastructure, separate from the legacy operators that businesses would traditionally associate with high-speed internet.
The reason this project came about is equally important. Cardiff Council had identified that many businesses in the city were poorly served when it came to high-speed connectivity. In some areas, firms had limited options: old copper technology that could no longer meet their needs, or more expensive direct internet access that was not always realistic for smaller companies. Cardiff Council raised £7.7 million to build a new network, with backing from Welsh Government. Elevate – a business internet and managed IT network service provider with a track record of delivering similar projects across other UK cities – won the contract to deliver it, and we completed that work in March last year.
For Elevate, this is exactly the type of city-scale infrastructure we exist to deliver. Cardiff is our sixth hypercity, and while every city is different, the principle is the same: provide businesses with a modern digital foundation that gives them more choice, greater resilience and the ability to plan ahead. We own and operate our own networks, and we have our own engineers. This allows us to provide not just the connection, but also the crucial services that sit around it, including WiFi and cybersecurity.
The strongest impact is often felt by SMEs. One of the core reasons for building the network was to support the growth of smaller businesses in Cardiff, because the journey from small to medium-sized company is where infrastructure can either enable progress or hold it back. There comes a point where a business needs excellent internet to grow. That might be because it is taking on more staff, using more cloud-based systems, handling larger files, moving into new premises or dealing with clients and suppliers in more data-heavy ways.
Cardiff has strong and growing sectors where that need is particularly clear. Media and creative businesses, technology firms, fintech companies and pharma organisations all rely on connectivity that can cope with modern demands. These are sectors where small firms can grow into substantial employers, but only if the infrastructure around them supports that journey. A business cannot properly future-proof itself if the network it relies on is already struggling.
The same point applies to larger organisations, although their needs are often different. A major company may already have leased lines or dedicated internet access (DIA), but it will also want resilience. It may need backups on backups because even short periods of downtime can carry serious operational consequences. For those firms, Cardiff’s independent fibre network gives another route, another layer of resilience and another reason to see the city as a credible place to operate.
This is also part of a much wider economic story. Cardiff’s historic growth was shaped by infrastructure, from coal and the docks to the transport networks that followed. Today, the infrastructure that matters most to many businesses is digital. Data, systems, communication and security now sit at the centre of how organisations function. If Cardiff wants to continue attracting and growing the right mix of businesses, it needs the technology to match that ambition, and our network enables that.
The fact that the network is 10 Gbps capable as standard is important because this is not simply about solving today’s broadband problems. It is about giving businesses room to grow into what comes next. More organisations are moving systems to the cloud, using real-time data, adopting digital tools and looking at how technology can improve productivity. Connectivity does not answer all of those questions on its own, but without it many of those opportunities remain out of reach.
What we offer through the Cardiff hypercity network is therefore not just speed. It is a more complete proposition: a modern fibre connection, local accountability, engineering expertise and the wider services that businesses increasingly need alongside their connectivity. That includes secure, reliable WiFi and cybersecurity support, because as companies become more connected, they also need to think carefully about how their data and systems are protected.
For businesses in Cardiff, the opportunity is practical. If your current connectivity is restricting how you work, the hypercity network may offer another option. If you are planning to grow, move premises, adopt new technology or build more resilience into your operations, it gives you a stronger platform from which to do so.
For Elevate, the aim is to make sure businesses understand what is now available to them and how it can support their next stage of development. Cardiff now has its own independent fibre network. The task now is to ensure the companies that can benefit from it know how to access it.
Awen Evans talks about this and more on the Elevate podcast Powering Cardiff’s Digital Future here:
