Quickline Secure £1.8m North Lincolnshire Broadband Contract

Broadband ISP Quickline (part of the Bigblu group) has today won its third state aid supported UK broadband delivery contract in the space of a month. The latest deal is worth £1.8m and will see the operator expand their fixed wireless and “full fibre” network to cover 1,500 extra premises in rural parts of North Lincolnshire.

At present the provider already has a wireless broadband network in the area and their new deal with the North Lincolnshire Council (NLC) will see that extended to another 1,500 premises by the end of 2022. All of the affected premises should get access to at least “superfast” (30Mbps+) speeds, although some will also be able to connect at “ultrafast” (100Mbps+) or even “gigabit” (1000Mbps) levels of performance.

The contract provides for a total network investment of £1.8m, which includes £1.0m from the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD) and £0.4m from the local authority. On top of that Quickline itself has agreed to invest £0.4m to support the deployment. The ISP also expects to deliver at least its targeted return on capital of c.15% over the life of the contract.

Steve Jagger, CEO of Quickline, said:

“The variety of solutions we provide means that we are well placed to build on the recent tender wins. We continue to work closely with the Government and Local Authorities and are delighted to be able to further grow our reach through this latest win. We believe that there is significant scope for us to help close the digital divide and we look forward to supporting further initiatives in due course.”

Andrew Walwyn, CEO of Bigblu Broadband, added:

“We are delighted by the continued progress at Quickline as it takes advantage of the significant growth opportunity. Its strong technology portfolio means that it is extremely well placed to support the Government’s ambition of nationwide gigabit coverage by 2025. With the combination of Government tenders, M&A and organic investment underpinning its strategy we remain excited by the expected pace of growth.”

This is the third tender won by Quickline in quick succession under the Building Digital UK (BDUK) Superfast Programme, which has also seen them scoop a £8.1m rollout deal for 8,000 premises in other parts of Lincolnshire (here) and a £9.1m contract for network coverage to 6,700 extra premises across rural West Yorkshire and York (here).

In addition, Quickline was selected by the DCMS in February 2020 to lead a £6m 5G project to boost rural connectivity in North Yorkshire. As a result of all this the operator is also planning to invest further capital into scaling-up the organisation,

Through a combination of its current footprint, the three tenders and Rural Gigabit Vouchers, Quickline now claims to be seeing scope to target 100,000 premises over the next few years. At present it’s still unclear how many of these will benefit from full fibre (FTTP).