Fibre broadband project B4RN launches share offer

A Lancashire-based community fibre optic broadband project has declared the search for investment to fund the rollout was an "exceptional success".

Broadband for the Rural North (B4RN) is looking to raise £2 million to finance the deployment by selling shares and is encouraging local residents carrying out the improvement work to invest.

The team behind B4RN have promised that the initiative will create skills and jobs in the Lune Valley and Trough of Bowland areas, and that revenues will be spent locally wherever possible.

A packed house of professional organisations, journalists, industry commentators and members of the local community attended the share launch in Lancaster, with B4RN chief executive Professor Barry Forde on hand to explain the offer.

The first cheque for shares was presented by Walter Willcox from Surrey.

Farmer's wife and rural broadband pioneer Christine Conder has previously summed up the B4RN ethos by explaining: "If we don't do it ourselves then it will never get done, so B4RN is the answer."