BT 2011 Annual Report Download - page 24

21BT GROUP PLC ANNUAL REPORT & FORM 20-F 2011
BUSINESS REVIEW
BUSINESS REVIEW OUR RESOURCES
BT’s deployment of FTTC and FTTP will underpin the
communications infrastructure for the future UK economy. In so
doing, the enhanced internet speeds made possible by super-fast
fibre-based broadband increase the ability of our customers to
work from home and access services without travel, yielding
environmental benefits. In addition to facilitating lower carbon
alternatives for customers, we continue to look for ways to reduce
the energy consumption associated with delivering super-fast
broadband.
For business customers, we have also continued to extend our fibre
Ethernet footprint, from 600 nodes in 2009 to 1,000 nodes in
2011. Ethernet is a next generation data connectivity service
offering high-speed, lower cost connectivity for large volumes of
data between sites.
For non-domestic customers requiring international services, our
international MPLS network provides coverage and support around
the world. It provides the performance, reliability, and security of a
leased-line network with the scalability and flexibility of an internet
protocol (IP) network. The BT MPLS service allows customers to
prioritise traffic based on application, ensuring essential data
applications are served irrespective of the growth of competing,
lower priority traffic.
Global research capability
Creating attractive and competitive propositions for customers is
critical to the future of BT. We operate an open innovation model,
whereby our research and development team works with
customers, partners and universities around the world. They do so
in partnership with our dedicated innovation scanning teams in the
US, Asia, Europe and the Middle East, which identified more than
400 new technologies, business propositions and market trends
over the year.
BT also seeks to drive agility and efficiency in the development
process through our global development centres, which are located
in the UK, US, Europe and India. In so doing, we bring our
innovation scanning and research teams closer to our customers,
designers and product development teams, so that we can quickly
capitalise on the opportunities they uncover. In 2011 we invested
£684m (2010: £789m) in global research and development to
support our drive for innovation. This investment comprised
capitalised software development costs of £295m (2010: £345m)
and research and development operating costs of £389m (2010:
£444m).
This year, we have applied our research and innovation capability
to a number of strategic areas for the business – in particular
enhancing BT Vision and the delivery of other information and
entertainment to customers. We have also supported BT’s wi-fi
service with the development of BT’s first smartphone application.
In 2011 we filed patent applications for 62 inventions (2010: 63).
We routinely seek patent protection in different countries including
Cabinet
Homes/BusinessesExchanges
FTTC
FTTP
Copper
Copper
Fibre
Fibre
Our next generation access technologies
Health and safety
The health and safety of our people remains of paramount
importance and we continue to seek improvements by focusing on
behavioural and/or lifestyle changes to reduce risk and improve
health. Details of time lost to injury and sickness and their cost to
BT are shown in the table below. The rise in lost time injuries is
largely attributable to accidents associated with the extended
period of ice and snow in the UK winter and some contribution
from an increased overtime requirement in the field engineering
workforce.
Lost time injury rate – lost time injury cases expressed as a rate per
100,000 hours worked on a 12-month rolling average
Non financial performance
Target 2012 2011 2010 2009
Reduce to 0.200 cases 0.225 0.209 0.160
Financial performance
Cost to the business arising
from injuries resulting in time
off work £6.1m £5.6m £7.0m
Sickness absence rate - percentage of calendar days lost to sickness
absence expressed as a 12-month rolling average
Non financial performance
Target 2012 2011 2010 2009
Reduce to 2.29% 2.41% 2.46% 2.17%
Financial performance
BT sick pay costs £90.1m £95.4m £85.2m
Networks and platforms
One of our most valuable resources is our fixed-line
communications network, which is the most comprehensive in the
UK with around 5,600 exchange areas, 670 local and 120 trunk
processor units.
We own and maintain the ‘last mile’ of the UK’s local access
network – the copper wires and fibre connecting homes and
businesses to the core network – operating approximately 120m
kilometres of copper. In addition, our plans for deploying super-
fast broadband in the UK will result in the installation of over
50,000 kilometres of fibre.
BT continues to invest in broadband in the UK, offering a range
of services delivered over copper and fibre. Our copper wire
broadband service offers speeds of up to 8Mbps (ADSL) and up
to 20Mbps where we have upgraded service to ADSL2+. Already,
around 99% of UK premises can receive ADSL service. We aim to
make ADSL2+ services available to around 80% of properties by
December 2011.
Our super-fast fibre-based broadband offers speeds of up to
40Mbps (FTTC) and 100Mbps (FTTP). We aim to deploy super-fast
broadband to two thirds of UK premises by the end of 2015. Our
FTTC product links roadside cabinets to telephone exchanges and
our copper local loop is used to deliver super-fast broadband to
customer premises. FTTP involves installing fibre into homes or
premises, superseding the copper local loop. Our fibre services are
competition ready from the day they are installed – other CPs can
buy access to the fibre on wholesale terms and then sell to
customers in competition with BT Retail.
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