By Business & Finance 
Pictured: Wolfwalkers, the Oscar-nominated animated feature from Cartoon Saloon
Cartoon Saloon – one of the many Irish businesses riding the digital wave of Fibre-to-the-Building broadband, by John Keaney, SIRO CEO
Making a movie involves a cast of thousands. So how do you complete an Oscar nominated animated feature in the midst of a global pandemic. The studio bosses at Cartoon Saloon didn’t know how they would put the finishing touches to Wolfwalkers, never mind start the slate of other work they had lined up.
While most people would think that when everyone is working remotely, your office broadband connection is the least of your worries. In reality, it is more important than ever as Cartoon Saloon was to find out. Fortunately, their Kilkenny studio had just been connected to SIRO’s Fibre-to-the-Building network before the breakout of Covid-19.
For a company whose work revolves around collaborating on large files, the Fibre-to-the-Building broadband connection meant that staff had access to large files and office applications remotely via a secure VPN solution, as well as the ability to share content with colleagues and clients across the globe.
Unlike traditional Fibre broadband, Cartoon Saloon has a tailored Fibre-to-the-Building business broadband service in place. What most companies do not realise is that they are actually using a residential Fibre broadband service, which simply is not suitable for their needs – a fact that is suddenly becoming obvious in the midst of the pandemic as their service slows to a crawl.
Regular Fibre broadband is typically delivered to a regular telecoms cabinet near to your company premises, with a copper connection serving as the last mile. There are a number of problems with this. You are effectively sharing a service with neighbouring premises and the quality of your broadband declines due to the copper connection.
In contrast, a Fibre-to-the-Building broadband service consists of a fibre-optic cable connected directly to your premises. It is a dedicated connection that is not shared with other users and it has no copper connections at any point to slow down the network.
The crucial aspect of a Fibre-to-the-Building business broadband service is that it is an asymmetric service where upload speeds are the same as download speeds, meaning that it is specifically designed for the demands of a modern business where supporting video and large file sharing, multiple remote users, cloud-based applications and smart technologies is a must. If a company is using a residential fibre broadband service, their upload speeds will be around 10% of the download speed.
SIRO, a joint venture between the ESB and Vodafone, is building Ireland’s only 100% Fibre-to-the-Building broadband network. Using the existing ESB network, SIRO delivers fibre-optic cables all the way to the building. Our Fibre-to-the-Building technology is recognised as the only future proofed broadband in Ireland, with a solution specifically tailored for business providing Enterprise grade SLA services, including a 24/7 option to give your company peace of mind.
Our services are available from a range of broadband retailers such as Vodafone, Digiweb, Viatel, Airwire, Blacknight Internet Solutions, Carnsore Broadband and Westnet. To enquire about switching to SIRO, simply search your Eircode on SIRO.ie to find out which retailers are available at your business address.
