UPC Netherlands doubles upload speeds for broadband

Liberty Global-owned cable operator UPC Netherlands has increased the upload speed of its internet packages, in most cases doubling the existing upload speed.

The 2.5Mbps upload speed associated with UPC’s 50Mbps download service has been upped to 5Mbps, while the 6Mbps and 10Mbps speeds associated with the 120Mbps and 200Mbps services respectively have also been doubled.

UPC is not levying any additional charges for the new speeds, which it says will enable user to share information and send data to the cloud more quickly.

The move follows a test period when the new speeds were made available to a limited number of customers.

UPC said that research carried out by the Technical University of Eindhoven and Dialogic had calculated that demand for download speed by 2020 would average 165Mbps, with demand for upload speed averaging 20Mbps, compared with 21.4Mpbs and 2.2Mbps today.

UPC Netherlands chief technology officer Giovanni Piccirilli said that the implementation of the new DOCSIS 3.1 standard would enable the company to offer 1Gbps downstream and 100Mbps upstream within a few years.