GLASGOW, U.K. -- THUS plc, today launched Demon City and National Ethernet, high performance Ethernet services that allows Small to Medium Enterprises (SMEs) to link sites within or between towns or cities across the UK. These new services allow seamless sharing of data and applications across multiple offices and have been launched to address SMEs' increasing bandwidth requirements.

The new Demon City and National Ethernet services are high performance managed data networks offering SMEs the same speed and flexibility as they get from their Local Area Network (LAN) over multiple sites across the UK.

The permanent, uncontended connection is available at speeds ranging from 2Mbps to 1Gbps, depending on a customer's requirements. Bandwidth changes can be made remotely and at short notice, allowing customers to react to changing business needs without investing in new equipment.

Demand for Ethernet has grown considerably as SMEs look to converge voice, video and data applications onto the same network, implement disaster recovery solutions and consolidate IT infrastructure in one site. Relative to more traditional services such as leased lines the Demon Ethernet services offer faster speeds at more affordable prices and because most company LANs are already Ethernet environments this makes integration of National and City Ethernet cost-effective and very simple.

"SMEs are becoming ever-more sophisticated in their use of technology - whether that is building an e-commerce presence, or using a disaster recovery back up site - and their bandwidth and service requirements are becoming much greater," said Nigel Stevens, Product Director, THUS plc. "In addition to speed and capacity, our customers also want flexibility and scalability. Demon Ethernet provides all of these, as well as helping prepare SMEs for the next step, which is the convergence of voice and data in a single network."

THUS plc