Despite the increased rapid roll-out of gigabit fixed broadband across the UK, service provider Olilo believes that products and those who provide them have to date concentrated on mass-market entertainment, and now it has officially introduced a multi-gig broadband service in the UK, offering a network that it says is built specifically for techies, engineers, sysadmins and home lab enthusiasts.
Olilo describes itself as a UK-based broadband provider dedicated to the technical community. By investing in its own network infrastructure and systems, and by involving its customers in every stage of development, it has been able to deliver symmetrical multi-gigabit broadband with features such as static IPv4 addresses and native IPv6.
The company says that, unlike mainstream broadband firms, it has created an infrastructure and service model designed entirely around the needs of technically minded users.
The company has built its own Layer 2 network from the ground up using Juniper hardware, engineered entirely by its in-house network team. Its developers have also created custom systems with the aim of giving techies control and visibility.
Olilo’s network peers with all three major internet exchanges in London, and has direct connectivity to tier 1 carriers, including GTT. According to BGP Tools, Olilo is currently ranked as the 24th most peered network in the UK.
The public launch of the network follows what Olilo says is a successful paid closed-beta phase involving over 150 techie customers, whose feedback continues to directly shape the company’s progression. This approach is said to be strengthened by Olilo’s Discord community of more than 500 members, where customers and engineers interact openly.
Olilo stresses that transparency is a core principle for the company, with users actively involved in influencing future developments and decisions. It also assured that the initial public roll-out will be tightly managed to guarantee performance for early adopters.
By combining purpose-built infrastructure, direct customer engagement and a focus on technical empowerment, the company aims to set a new standard for broadband services aimed at those who demand more than mainstream providers can deliver.
“Techies have been ignored for way too long,” said Olilo CEO Liam Mulryan. “They want broadband that doesn’t flinch, with a static IPv4 on day one, native IPv6 with a /48, the option to bring their own IPs, run BGP and the freedom to use their own hardware without being treated like a liability. In an industry obsessed with catering to the masses and chasing profit over performance, no one has been willing to build for them, so we did.
“Olilo is built by engineers for techies with no arbitrary throttling or traffic shaping, and no pointless rules,” he said. “We want to see home labs in spare bedrooms and sysadmins pushing their networks just because they can. We are not the past, we are the future, and we are here to shake up the industry.”
