Telecommunications operator, Ocean, is to be connected to the British Telecom pan-European fibre-optic backbone, Farland, from June this year. Ocean is part of the British Telecom group, which bought Esat earlier this year.

Ocean said the move would allow Irish companies unlimited access to Europe's largest broadband network, enabling them to transmit large volumes of high-speed data across Europe and worldwide.

BT is investing £32 million sterling (€53.2 million) in expanding its network to cover Scandinavia, Spain and Ireland.

Mr George McGrath, chief executive of Ocean, said unlimited access to the broadband was the most important factor for the development of Ireland as an e-commerce hub.