Lothian Broadband Gobbles Rival Scottish ISP Highland Wireless

Fixed wireless and full fibre ISP Lothian Broadband, which covers rural parts of East Lothian and Mid Lothian in Scotland, has acquired the entire issued share capital of rival provider Highland Wireless (Highland Wireless & IT Solutions), which operates much further north and covers around 4,000 premises (see image).

Until recently Lothian Broadband was still focused on delivering Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) services to local homes and businesses within their patch, although last year also saw them move to extend their fledgling deployment of an ultrafast Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) network in the East Lothian village of Gifford (here).

Meanwhile Highland Wireless (HW) has a similar FWA network, albeit mostly around their base of Edderton and a few other nearby locations in the Scottish Highlands. Interestingly one of our readers recently spotted that Lothian Broadband had, on 6th October 2020, acquired the entire issued share capital of HW (the transaction value was not disclosed).

A quick look at HW’s most recent balance sheet to 31st May 2020 reveals that the company had net assets of £135,454, although sadly we aren’t able to judge other areas like turnover.

Lothian Broadband has informed ISPreview.co.uk that this is all part of their strategy to become the “leading fixed wireless operator” in Scotland. The ISP believes that broadband delivery to small towns, villages and communities in rural Scotland will need a mix of fibre and high capacity fixed wireless networks. On top of that they see “tremendous potential” for network expansion north of Inverness.

Nic McCormick, MD of Lothian Broadband, said:

“This transaction is an ideal fit with our strategy to expand our fixed wireless footprint in Scotland and to add new territory where our local knowledge will be key to the deployment of targeted fibre infrastructure. We are hugely impressed with the network Cameron has built at Highland and we are delighted to welcome him to the growing team here at Lothian Broadband.”

Cameron Warren, MD of Highland Wireless, added:

“This is an exciting time to be joining forces with Nic and the team at Lothian Broadband. The company has ambitious plans to scale up its investment in infrastructure.”

Suffice to say that it will be interesting to see how this operator grows over the next few years, particularly with respect to their plans for more investment in fibre optic infrastructure.