FAST FOOD giant Burger King has chosen Internet service provide Onyx to host its website.

Web hosting involves using a third party's equipment to manage the space that a website occupies and to guarantee fast access to the site by its users.

The burger giant's site - www.burgerking.co.uk - won the Best Food Retailer Website at the London International Advertising Awards in November.

The site was designed by new media agency BlackID, a customer of Onyx, which is located in Middlesbrough.

BlackID is moving all its clients' hosting requirements to Onyx.

Neil Stephenson, operations director at Onyx, said: "We're very pleased to be hosting such a prestigious website, as we have invested heavily in our web hosting services.

"Quality web hosting is widely seen as a major growth market within the technology sector, and our own experience bears that our."

A recent survey of prospects for European web hosting services, predicted that the market in Europe would grow from £644m last year to more than £3bn by 2004.

Last year Onyx acquired Digiserve.com, the international web hosting company with facilities in Washington DC and London, in a deal that saw the Digiserve managing director join the Onyx board.

Onyx, founded in 1994, now provides web hosting for companies in more than 40 countries.