(Telecompaper) Irish operator Eircom has announced an increase to its planned national fibre footprint from 1.2 million homes and businesses to 1.4 million homes and businesses across the country. As a result, 70 percent of the country will have access to fibre broadband speeds of up to 100 Mbps by July 2016. The fibre roll-out programme is currently ahead of schedule and the company is on track to pass 700,000 premises by end-2013. This announcement means that an additional 562 communities across all 26 counties will get access to the eFibre service.