Consultation outcome

Closure of the September 2022 National Rolling Open Market Review

Updated 24 March 2023

The September 2022 National Rolling Open Market Review (NR OMR) ran from  5 September to 17 October 2022.

Building Digital UK (BDUK) requested that suppliers submit their national broadband infrastructure plans, so as to confirm where gigabit-capable broadband infrastructure currently exists or is planned to be built in the UK over the next 3 years.

We have now completed evaluating all submissions received and issued formal responses to all suppliers who submitted information over the course of this exercise; including the subsidy control classification treatment of their existing or planned qualifying broadband infrastructure.

Details on the classification system of White, Grey, Black and Under Review and methodology can be found in the section below BDUK Classifications and methodology for this NR OMR.

Further information on the OMR/PR process and how we reach our conclusions can be found in our Subsidy Control Guidance document.

1. Purpose of the National Rolling Open Market Review

The purpose of the NR OMR, which operates on a 4-monthly basis (January, May and September), is to ensure that BDUK has the most up to date information about suppliers’ existing and planned build over the next 3-year period.

This will support better strategic planning and prioritisation of procurement Intervention Areas (IAs), streamline the OMR process and minimise the risk of BDUK intervening in an area that would disrupt existing commercial plans.

Data collected from the NR OMR will also be used to inform GigaHubs and UK Gigabit Voucher eligibility as well as support the development of other potential BDUK interventions.

2. BDUK classifications and methodology for this National Rolling Open Market Review

During the NR OMR, BDUK categorised premises as gigabit White, Grey, Black or Under Review.

Subsidy control classifications are set out below:

• White - indicates premises with no gigabit network infrastructure and none is likely to be developed within 3 years^{[footnote 1]}

• Grey - indicates premises where a single qualifying gigabit infrastructure from a single supplier is available, or is to be deployed within the coming 3 years^{[footnote 1]}

• Black - indicates premises with two or more qualifying gigabit infrastructures from different suppliers being available, or will be deployed within the coming 3 years^{[footnote 1]}

• Under Review - indicates premises where suppliers have reported current or planned commercial broadband coverage, but where claimed current gigabit coverage has not been verified, or, in respect of planned build, where evaluators are confident that gigabit infrastructure will be delivered, but some risks to delivery remain, or there are some gaps in evidence

BDUK will only provide subsidy to target premises that have been designated as White. Premises which have been designated as Under Review may be included within the Deferred Scope of a procurement. Where this is the case, a further review will be undertaken to confirm whether they are Grey or White before they are released for build.

In accordance with BDUK standard OMR/PR processes, supplier data submitted during the NR OMR has been mapped using a methodology that protects commercially sensitive supplier data.

3. Summary of September National Rolling Open Market Review findings - premises eligibility

For presentational purposes only, postcode-level mapping has been used to present the NR OMR regional maps showing eligible premises. (NB we will only subsidise build to premises which have been designated as White - postcodes are not used to determine IAs for subsidy).

For this purpose, postcodes have been classified as follows:

1. A postcode is White if any White premises are present.

2. A postcode is Under Review if any Under Review premises are present.

3. A postcode is Black if all premises in the postcode are classified Black.

4. A postcode is Grey if all premises are Grey, or a mixture of Grey and Black.

The September 2022 NR OMR postcode level maps summarising these premises classifications have been provided on the September 2022 NR OMR homepage. Suppliers - please note that these maps do not show which Unique Property Reference Numbers (UPRNs) have been determined as White and Under Review.

Please note that the recently awarded Project Gigabit contracts by BDUK may not be reflected within the outputs below, as a result of the timelines involved for this mapping exercise. BDUK will endeavour to ensure that this is corrected for future NR OMR outputs as required.

The outcome of the September 2022 NR OMR is summarised in terms of White, Grey, Black and Under Review postcodes and premises below which incorporates all regions across England only.

Postcode classification	Number of postcodes	Number of gigabit Black premises	Number of gigabit Grey premises	Number of gigabit Under Review premises	Number of gigabit White premises
White	381,759	539,321	2,556,882	1,846,916	2,866,478
Under Review	477,361	571,581	2,827,324	5,067,233	0
Grey	493,118	1,499,315	8,011,079	0	0
Black	140,139	2,893,539	0	0	0
Total	1,492,377	5,503,756	13,395,285	6,914,149	2,866,478

4. Differences between National Rolling Open Market Review and Public Review outcome classifications

Please note, the data held by BDUK following a Public Review (PR) is used to define IAs for procurements at a point in time.

Not all active suppliers were invited to contribute to the September 2022 NR OMR process.

Therefore NR OMR data may differ from the outcome of a PR due to the point in time that the data was captured, or due to different suppliers providing responses.

IA eligibility is therefore defined using a combination of PR and NR OMR data (ie where a supplier has not been invited to contribute to the NR OMR, the PR would be expected to take precedence).

The data submitted to the NR OMR will continue to be processed in the same way as that submitted to previous local OMRs and will be used for mapping categorisations of UPRNs. This will generally be fed into a PR process for new areas. However, If BDUK receives new data for UPRNs which have been the subject of a previous PR determination, if it meets the evidential requirements, BDUK may use NR OMR data to update the previous areas by area PR determinations at our own discretion.

5. September National Rolling Open Market Review Conclusion

For the purposes of the September 2022 NR OMR data was requested from a selection of suppliers who have previously submitted national returns through local OMRs/PRs.

This September 2022 NR OMR provided BDUK with the opportunity to refine processes for the collection and ingestion of national data in advance of continuing to expand the scope of the NR OMR to all suppliers in the future.

The September 2022 NR OMR outputs have been provided via 10 separate files geographically broken down by Project Gigabit Lots.

The Lot and region output splits within each file are available below:

• Yorkshire and the Humber (Lots 8, 20, 23 and 31)

• East Midlands (Lots 3,10,11 and 12)

• South West (Lots 6, 14, 18, 30 and 32)

• South East (Lots 1,13,16, 22, 26, 27 and 29)

• Greater London (Lot 37)

• East of England (Lots 2,5, 7 and 21)

• North West (Lots 9, 17, 28 and 36)

• North East (Lots 4, 34 and 38)

• West Midlands(Lots 15, 19, 24, 25 and 35)

• No region

Please see our latest Project Gigabit update for further details on Project Gigabit procurement timelines.

The latest iteration of the NR OMR launched on 20 January and closed for responses on 3 March 2023. We were pleased to extend this invite for all suppliers to submit a response for consideration for the first time.

BDUK is currently undertaking evaluation activities for the January 2023 NR OMR. If you have any questions on the January 2023 NR OMR process, please refer to the Request For Information GOV.UK page.

In the interim, if you require any further information, please do not hesitate to contact us via ukgigabit@bduk.zendesk.com.

1. There may be occasions where credible plans extend beyond a 3-year period, in that case, these may be taken into account. ↩ ↩² ↩³