A number of virtual villages will be established as part of a wider initiative to test the abilities of next-generation broadband, it has been revealed.

Lead technologist with the Technology Strategy Board Nick Appleyard, in an interview with the Times during this week's Innovate 09 event, explained that the organisation is to identify certain communities which can be upgraded with a five-year advancement of internet speeds.

He told the newspaper: "It needs to be big enough to get statistically useful information out of it and we think that scale is a few thousand people, a small community.

"The intention is not that this should reach the scale that it becomes a significant presence in the marketplace."

These locations will likely be in discreet locations in order to analyse the data more accurately for the community as a whole, Mr Appleyard added.

During Innovate 09, a number of main stage panel sessions were held to understand growth opportunities, including such sectors as energy generation and supply, life sciences and the maintenance of a low-carbon economy.

In a recent survey of SMEs for Connect, the two most important benefits of outsourcing were guaranteed response times and allowing in-house IT staff to concentrate on more strategic issues.