WINTER 2018 • SPOTLIGHT • 17


A DIGITAL TECH TURNOVER OF


£7.9bn DIGITAL TECH


BUSINESS BIRTHS 198


JOBS IN DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY


24,754 GROSS VALUE ADDED


£2.9bn


It was announced in March of this year that Bristol would host the world’s first public 5G experience. 5G is the next generation of mobile connectivity, which will work in tandem with 4G to deliver high speed wireless connectivity – expected to deliver speeds of 10-20 times that of 4G network with a latency of single digit milliseconds. This would allow individuals to download a high definition film in less than a minute. The likelihood is that 5G will offer higher speeds than the current fixed line network and is seen as vital for the ‘Internet of Things’ (IoT).


The IoT describes anything that is connected to the internet and provides the ability to create the next generation of smart devices. This new era has been called the ‘Fourth Industrial Revolution’ and experts believe that more than half of new businesses will run on the IoT by 2020. In 2016, a report by SAS and the Centre for Economic Business Research predicted that the IoT and Big Data will be worth £322 billion to the UK economy by 2020. One of the most well-known applications for the IoT is the driverless car.


The UK government announced in 2018 that it wants to be at the forefront of the self-driving car industry and expects it to be worth £28 billion in the next 17 years. Testing is underway, with autonomous cars expected to be in commercial use by 2021. Bristol currently has two trials in progress; Venturer consortium and Flourish consortium. Both have same high-profile partners including AXA, Atkins, Bristol City Council, the University of Bristol and the University of West England, although Venturer is backed by BAE Systems and Flourish is backed by Airbus.


Bristol is clearly leading the way within the UK in the technology sector and is trying to make sure that it has the necessary infrastructure to support this long-term growth. Below this though, it


requires the fibre networks to support the wireless networks and the transfer of big data, as well as the physical storage such as the data centre.


The new industrial revolution currently underway will see a new type of data centre, currently known as an ‘Edge’ site required to support the more localised services that the IoT both provide and require. New Edge sites will be required to connect back and support the low latency applications underway. An Edge data centre is simply a smaller scale, often modular data centre, that sits on the edge of the network. The primary focus of these centres is to reduce the latency, meaning the time it takes for data to travel from one end to another. Reduced latency has always been important in the financial industry for High Frequency Trading, but it is now becoming more important in other parts of our lives. One of the ways we are experiencing this at the moment is via streaming sites such as Netflix and Amazon. Lower latency potentially leads to higher quality of online experience, while higher latency means increased possibility of the dreaded buffering.


City Fibre recognised that Bristol is one of the most digitally advanced cities in the UK, thus chose Bristol as one of the first locations for their new gigabit network. This network will help support the data requirements of Bristol and reduce the latency both for the residents and the companies at the forefront of Bristol’s Digital Revolution. This will crucially require Edge data centres to support it and as such will give Bristol a higher data centre footprint than it currently does.


Bristol is one of the leading technology hubs in the country and capable of attracting some of the most talented people for work. Going forward Bristol will need to back up this creativity with the infrastructure to support the services that it is investing so heavily in. What is clear though, Bristol has a bright future ahead.


Colliers International


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