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Multi-Network UK ISP ZYBRE Acquires Rival Air Broadband

Friday, Nov 4th, 2022 (8:00 am) - Score 2,664
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Broadband and Cloud Gaming ISP ZYBRE, which offers services to UK homes over a number of Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) networks (Openreach, MS3, FullFibre etc.), has this morning announced the acquisition of rival provider Air Broadband that adopts a similar approach to network aggregation.

Air Broadband is one of several in the market, like ZYBRE, that has made a name for itself by selling services (Layer 2) over lots of different full fibre networks (e.g. CityFibre, FullFibre Ltd, MS3, OFNL, Prime Fibre, Lila Connect [VXFIBER], Connect Fibre and Gigaclear etc.), albeit with the caveat that all of these different networks also result in different package features, contract terms and prices.

Managing that many different wholesale networks is not an easy task, but both ZYBRE and Air Broadband seem to have found a way that works for them, and thus today’s acquisition is one that would appear to make a fair bit of sense. But merging all of their respective customers and package combinations seems like it could be quite a tedious task.

At the time of writing, ZYBRE has not said how this change will affect Air Broadband’s existing customers.

Jonny Robinson, CEO of ZYBRE, said:

“Andrew and the team at Air, have done an excellent job in securing alternative network partnerships and have build a solid base of customers across the country.

This acquisition will be one of many consolidations in this market. For us Air brings us additional network infrastructure that we need to scale and we’ll be able to be competitive in key towns and cities.”

Andrew Glover, Air Broadband CEO, added:

“Joining forces with ZYBRE allows both companies to accelerate our growth, offering more customers ultrafast broadband and additional services.”

In terms of the deal itself, ZYBRE has not said how much money changed hands, but they have stated that the move brings their broadband base to over 10,000 customers. Not bad for a provider that has only been in the market for a fairly short period of time, but which already seems to have an ambitious strategy for growing their reach.

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Mark-Jackson
By Mark Jackson
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook and .
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Comments
17 Responses
  1. Avatar photo John says:

    Maybe they will update their postcode database as at present their website says that I can’t have OFNL whilst I am using it already.

  2. Avatar photo Anthony says:

    I hope this doesn’t mean Air will stop its social FTTP tarrif as they are currently the only provider offering a social FTTP tarrif.

    1. Avatar photo Iain says:

      Hopefully you’re right they don’t stop their social tariff.

      But to be fair to Vodafone (whom I often criticise!) their social tariff includes FTTP, according to the ISPreview report https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2022/10/isp-vodafone-uk-launch-12-social-tariff-for-home-broadband.html

      Vodafone’s tariff is cheaper but slower than Air’s.

    2. Avatar photo Andrew says:

      We have no plans to alter the Social Tariff, and Air Broadband will continue as a brand

    3. Avatar photo Iain says:

      Fantastic, Andrew. Congrats on the aquisition.

  3. Avatar photo Stephen Hier says:

    Broadband has been intermittent since last night. Some internet sites work where others fail. Tried calling Air Broadband initially but wasn’t aware they were bought by Zyber last November. (Thanks for leeting me know) I have been unable to get through and no one is answering my emails. Just need to find out when this outage will be fixed.

    1. Avatar photo Lloyd says:

      I have been experiencing the exact same issue. Called in the morning and spoke to Air, rang back in the afternoon (because the call back I was promised never happened) for the call to be answered by Zybre, this is when I was notified of the purchase of Air. I was again promised another call and still nothing. No updates on the issue and currently left with no Internet, no updates and unable to work. Can’t now communicate with Zybre until Monday as no weekend contacts. Very poor and I will be exploring alternative suppliers. I have been very happy with Ai until now having joined them as their 4th customer right at the statt

  4. Avatar photo Tracey says:

    We have the same problem, phoned and answered by zybre yesterday morning. Was told it was a problem out of their control, and should be fixed that day. Still not working, hope this gets resolved soon as need it for work. You would have thought they would have told us of the takeover.

    1. Avatar photo Marc says:

      We have been having the same problem as well (Since Friday 10th). Been trying to call the support lines all morning (Monday 13th) but no answer at all.

      We have had not updates as customers of the ownership change and now no updates regarding support for the issues. Download speeds affected, streaming TV apps not working (BBC, IT etc). Highly frustrating!

  5. Avatar photo Pam says:

    Exactly the same here. So disappointed! Whilst both CEOs are excited to join forces I certainly don’t feel the same excitement, just annoyance.

  6. Avatar photo Ollie says:

    Also the same issue, most sites work, some don’t. Although those sites which don’t work via a direct connection to Air, do work if I connect my device to a VPN. Sites i’ve identified right now as not working at all: BBC, Santander, Steam, Battle.Net. Netflix is undeniably slow but accessible eventually. Again, all fine via a VPN connection. Rang Air today, got through to Zybre eventually. Was told they were aware of the issue and it should be fixed within the week (they were having a board meeting or something to come up with a fix).

    1. Avatar photo Ollie says:

      Update: my connection is now working normally.

  7. Avatar photo Brian says:

    Internet down yet again, last time was for 9 days in January – no apology, no answering calls, no refund – absolutely useless. Now down again 14/2/2! Have rung Support cut off 10 times, even got into a call waiting and still got cut off – will be cancelling as soon as can – but still several months away as under 18mths contract. So no VOIP landline and no internet. Would not recommend them to my worst enemy.

  8. Avatar photo Shan says:

    Preston Air broad band is out. Only found out about thia merger because i have been ringing about my line, i really need it for work and no one from zybre or Air are responding.

    Question, prior this air have been trying to fix a issue where i am on the 1gb package but only recieve 100mb, minium on contact is 450mb ish anyone else experienced this? All my internals seem fine. This is a long on going issue for me.

    1. Avatar photo William says:

      Sounds like a ethernet link stepping down from 1000 to 100. If it is all devices on the network it could be the cable going between the router and the fibre modem.

  9. Avatar photo William says:

    I to just found out about this as a result of the outage. I ordered my fibre with air just before Christmas and at no point was I made aware of this. I would have looked into Zybre before signing up.

    The phone support just says there is an outage and then hangs up. I’ve sent an email but doubt it will be acknowledged.

    The fault looks to be a packet routing issue as I get my normal public IP but then traceroutes just loops on two internal IP addresses once it leaves my public IP.

    Had I similar fault when I first joined but was fixed a day later.

    The issue now is for some reason I only have one option on cityfibre with talktalk. Let’s just say I wouldn’t have them unless they are my only option. Oh wait……

  10. Avatar photo Pedro says:

    Apparently Zybre/Air Broadband is in breach of its contractual obligations to CityFibre and a number of other suppliers. Customers have also raised major concerns regarding the quality of service they received from the company. I just want to know what the hell does this mean to customers!!! To get in touch with them it will be a nightmare to cancel the service, we were just told that the service could stop at any time

Comments are closed

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