Killarney and Riviera have become the latest suburbs to deploy their own fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) networks and join the growing trend of becoming a “fibrehood” much like Parkhurst, Greenside and Parktown North, telecommunications start-up Vumatel said on Friday.
Vumatel planned to start rolling out the fibre network in the Northern Johannesburg suburbs during the first quarter of this year.
“This is a positive and welcome development for Killarney–Riviera. Our residents will obtain numerous technological benefits from the project, but we will also see further increases in property prices because the availability of a first-world FTTH is very attractive to technologically-driven societies,” said New Killarney–Riviera Association chairperson Wayne Ford.
Vumatel CEO Niel Schoeman noted the increasing trend of neighbourhoods taking their broadband requirements into their own hands, which started when the Parkhurst Residents and Business Owners Association last year appointed Vumatel to establish an extensive FTTH network.
“There has been rapid and high-volume take-up of FTTH in Parkhurst and interest from other suburbs is increasingly evident,” he said, pointing out that the ability to have a stable, high-speed Internet connection was highly sought-after.