Track record
NHN was a named research-organisation partner on ONE WORD, a £9.5m DSIT-funded programme with £4.2m of additional commercial investment, delivered alongside 13 other organisations across Bath, Shrewsbury, Cardiff and Worcestershire.
49 5G radios were deployed across Bath (29), Shrewsbury (6) and Cardiff (11), plus a mobile "Network on Wheels" unit (3). That covered seven permanent venue deployments and six pop-up locations, all built from a standing start with no pre-existing neutral host estate.
| Location | Existing MNO speed | ONE WORD 5G-SA speed | Improvement |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bath City Centre | 18.77 Mbps | 640 Mbps | +621% |
| Bath Rugby Ground | 28.56 Mbps | 400 Mbps | +371% |
| Shrewsbury Quarry Park | 44.47 Mbps | 893 Mbps | +848% |
| Cardiff Market | 12.45 Mbps | 200 Mbps | +187% |
| Cardiff St Mary's Street | 28.83 Mbps | 170 Mbps | +141% |
Outdoor pole-mounted radios across the city centre, plus an indoor deployment at Bath Rugby that successfully live-streamed a U20 international rugby game to high-density crowds — the hardest possible test of capacity under load.
A live 5G deployment at one of the UK's best-known heritage sites, demonstrating UK-designed small cells from Antevia and cellXica reaching Technology Readiness Level 7 in a real operational environment.
Three different network types deployed in close proximity — a fibre/OpenRAN split, a wireless mesh, and an indoor small cell — creating a direct technology comparison test bed for neutral host architectures.
An outdoor deployment supporting the town's summer events programme, and the largest measured speed improvement anywhere in the programme at +848%.
Pop-up outdoor networks using Starlink backhaul supported festivals and events, alongside a mobile 'Network on Wheels' unit that provided connectivity for traders at a Victorian evening event in an area with previously little or no mobile coverage.
Connectivity supported traders across three city Christmas markets, where card payments had previously failed at peak footfall.
"Fabulous. Last year, there were so many times when it went off and I had to lose sales because people just didn't have the cash. This year it hasn't gone off once in the whole time I've been here and I've been so pleased with it and it's fast, so people can pay and go."
ONE WORD was delivered with 14 organisations — see the full partner list or read the policy, MOCN and security work behind it.