London Full Fibre Broadband ISP G.Network Appoints 3 New Senior Leaders

Alternative UK ISP G.Network, which has built a full fibre (FTTP) broadband network across parts of London and have just come out of administration “debt-free” (here), has today announced the appointment of three senior leaders to its executive team as the business enters a “new phase of growth” under the ownership of FitzWalter Capital.

Just to recap. G.Network originally aspired to expand their FTTP lines to cover 1.3 million premises in London by the end of 2026, but they ultimately ended up being impacted by an increasingly competitive environment and rising costs (high build costs, high interest rates etc.); this resulted in job cuts and a greater focus on commercialisation instead of new fibre build (here). The company eventually ended up being acquired by distressed debt specialist FitzWalter Capital (here and here), which reorganised them through a period of administration.

The company has since re-appointed David Sangster, the original co-founder of G.Network, to the role of Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and has just moved into a new office at Elephant and Castle, a purpose-designed space which is said to match the company’s “new ethos and enhanced ambitions” (i.e. another attempt to focus on commercialisation).

However, the main change today reflects the appointment of three new members to their senior leadership team, which includes Ed North joining as Chief Commercial Officer (he returns after previously being G.Network’s Sales Director until 2019), Mohammed Ahmed as Chief Financial Officer (Mo’s career spans senior finance roles at BT, National Grid, Merlin Entertainments, Hargreaves Lansdown and ICE Telecommunications etc.), and Mike Ghent as Chief Operating Officer (Mike was most recently COO at Spring Fibre, and before that, he served as Network Director at UK Broadband Limited and Three UK).

David Sangster said:

“As we return to growth, G.Network has ambitious plans to commercialise our outstanding network. We need first-class leaders to match that ambition and pace, which is why I am so pleased to welcome our new Executive team. Ed, Mo and Mike bring exactly the commercial, financial and operational expertise we need to accelerate growth and establish G.Network as the network of choice in London.

They will join the rest of the G.Network team in our beautiful new offices, where we’re already executing on our plans to give London the connectivity it deserves.”

Despite all the positive spin and talk of having enhanced ambitions, it’s worth remembering that the restructured business will naturally now be a lot more attractive as a consolidation target. This is something that an organisation like FWC is likely to find attractive, since they’d probably prefer to be more of a short-term holder of the business.

Lest we forget that G.Network has tried to push deeper commercialisation before, which proved difficult in such a competitive network environment (rivals like Openreach, Virgin Media (inc. nexfibre), CommunityFibre and Hyperoptic overbuild much of their patch). But somebody like CityFibre might have an interest in entering London, although they could also be looking at CommunityFibre and Hyperoptic too.