A US town with population of 300 is better connected than the UK’s tech flagship city of Bristol, research from Expert Market has revealed.
The sourcing firm’s findings suggest that the UK is falling woefully behind other nations for internet connectivity.
Elberta, an American town of less than 300 inhabitants has working 4G on all four main providers whereas Bristol, which is being plugged as the potential successor to silicon roundabout has limited and often non-existent coverage across the city.
Businesses and consumers in Bristol have to rely heavily on Wi-Fi connections in order to download bigger files, make video calls or stream content.
This begs the question, ‘if the United States can cover their very large territory with 4G, how can the UK remain on the side with less advanced mobile and internet coverage?’
EE is the only provider that boasts any coverage in Bristol, and even this is severely limited – Vodafone and O2 have admitted they are slow in bringing decent 4G coverage to the city.
In contrast, all four main American providers have more than 90% 4G coverage in Utah: AT&T has 91.90% 4G coverage all over the state, T-Mobile has 93.20%, Sprint follows with 94.14% and finally Sprint has the most 4G with 94.96%.
Lucile Michaut, Europe’s marketing manager at Expert Market, said:
“These findings are very alarming for the UK. If we are not able to be competent and valued competitors to the United States and other major nations, businesses will struggle to develop and the seriousness of our image as a country for growing technologies and start-ups will be impacted!”