ISPA has announced that Chris Townsend, the new Chief Executive of Broadband Delivery UK (BDUK), will deliver the keynote speech at the prestigious ISPA Awards ceremony on Thursday 10th July.

Rolling out superfast broadband has been one of the biggest and challenging infrastructure projects in the UK, and Chris has come from a commercial background at major projects such as the London 2012 Olympics and Transport for London. The speech is a good chance to meet ISPs in what has been a year of change in the Government’s broadband programme.  New projects and new funds have been announced to help connect the most rural areas and in cities, and the Connection Vouchers scheme has gone live, an initiative which saw a number of ISPA members register as suppliers.

Chris will also be able to see how ISPA members are investing in their networks, with more people getting faster speeds than ever at a lower price. The ISPAs will recognise the best performing ISPs across broadband, VoIP, hosting and cloud, as well as digital, customer service and favourites like Customer Choice and Internet Hero & Villain, and we expect 300 people to attend the black tie ceremony in London. The shortlist of all nominees can be seen here.

Announcing the keynote, ISPA Secretary General Nicholas Lansman said “It’s great to have Chris on board, and ISPA looks forward to working with BDUK to make sure the final phases recognise the technologies available. 2014 will be the 16th ISPA Awards, and a great way to celebrate the breadth and diversity of the UK internet industry and reward those who have innovated in the last year.”

Attending the ISPA Awards

The ISPA Awards will be on Thursday 10th July, at the Park Lane Hotel, London. Tickets can be booked here. We can also confirm that comedian Ben Norris will be the compere for the evening with the Dominos providing live music.

Sponsor the ISPA Awards

There are still limited sponsorship opportunities available for the ISPA Awards. To learn more about how your company can benefit from meeting 300 senior figures from across the internet industry, please click here.

About the ISPA Awards

The 2014 ISPA Awards will take place on 10th July 2014 at the Park Lane Hotel. These will be the 16th internet industry awards, with the ISPAs running since 1999. The Internet Hero and Internet Villain Awards are sponsored by Netlynk Direct. The Best VoIP Award is sponsored by Magrathea Telecom, with hosting specialists Tagadab sponsoring Best Use of Digital. Wick Hill is sponsoring the Internet Safety and Security Award.

About ISPA

The Internet Services Providers’ Association (ISPA UK) was established in 1995 and currently has 200 members and is the voice of the UK internet industry to Government, parliament, regulators and the media.

For a list of members or other information about ISPA, please visit our website on www.ispa.org.uk or follow us on twitter @ISPAUK. You can also reach us by phone on 0203 397 3308.

The views expressed in this release are those of the Internet Services Providers’ Association (ISPA) and do not necessarily reflect the corporate policies of the individual companies that are members of the Association or other organisations that may be mentioned in the release.