With £100 million of Government money up for grabs to improve the UK’s communication infrastructure by “super-connecting” cities and improving broadband speeds, competition is likely to be fierce between those bidding for a slice of the cash.

Four UK cities, London, Belfast, Cardiff and Edinburgh, are all guaranteed to receive funding, which will be used to create 80-100 megabits per second broadband access. However, six other places on the scheme are still available for any city boasting over 150,000 inhabitants that thinks it can help drive growth in this sector.

The Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport Jeremy Hunt has now confirmed that ten cities will be in the running for those final six places, including Birmingham, Bradford, Bristol, Glasgow, Leeds, Liverpool, Newcastle, Nottingham, Manchester and Sheffield.

The Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport Jeremy Hunt said: "The internet is now a fundamental part of our economy. We must ensure the UK has a broadband network fit for the digital age."

"Transforming communities into super-connected cities will enable them to compete with the world’s top digital cities."

“It will help them attract new jobs and new investment and make the UK a place where digital businesses look to come. It will help our creative industries and high-tech companies grow while making the UK even more attractive to overseas firms.”

Each city will have to submit a proposal for plans on how they’ll use the money by February 13, 2012 and the successful applications will be announced during the budget in March. The money will be split between the cities and the government will work with them to help boost broadband and create city-wide high-speed mobile connectivity.