Virgin plans world's fastest broadband

Telecoms and cable company Virgin Media unveiled plans to trialthe world's fastest broadband yesterday as it reported growingdemand for lightning-quick internet connections.The company said itwould test speeds of up to 1.5 gigabits per second - more than tentimes faster than its current premium service of 100 megabits persecond and 240 times quicker than the UK average.The trials willbegin this month at four companies in an area of London dubbed"silicon roundabout", but the service will eventually be offered tohomes as well as offices.Virgin Media said the speeds were possiblebecause it had invested GBP13 billion in fibre-optic networks. Theannouncement came as the Hampshire-based company revealed customergrowth had slowed in the three months to 31 March, with 128,600 newproduct users, compared with 232,300 in the first quarter of2010.But 39 per cent of new subscribers asked for speeds of 20megabits a second or more, compared to 15 per cent a year ago.VirginMedia, which is listed on both the London Stock Exchange and NewYork's Nasdaq, said operating profit for the period grew 58.9 percent year-on-year to GBP111 million on revenues of GBP982m.