AltNet Broadband ISP Voneus Boosted by Extra £25m Investment
Rural focused network builder and ISP Voneus, which currently aims to cover 350,000 UK premises via both their gigabit fixed wireless access (FWA) and Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband networks, has today secured a further £25m investment boost from Global Connectivity PLC (G-CON).
Voneus is currently being backed by up to £250m from investors such as Macquarie Capital, IIF, Tiger Infrastructure Partners and bank lenders. But the situation became a bit more complex after last year’s merger with SWS Broadband (Rural Broadband Solutions), Cadence Networks and Broadway Partners (here).
All of the above assets are now owned and operated through Voneus, which means Rural Broadband Solutions Holdings Limited (RBSHL) also owns a significant stake in Voneus Limited and Global Connectivity still retains its 15% stake in RBSHL. But today’s £25m capital investment by Voneus’ shareholders and lenders means that RBSHL increases its stake in the operator to 36% from 32%.
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Keith Harris, G-CON Executive Chairman, said:
“We are happy that our partner in RBSHL has increased its relative funding and thereby increased our ownership position of Voneus.”
The extra investment will no doubt assist in the operator’s future deployment plans and possibly help to fuel more mergers, although in the meantime we remain in the dark as to the operator’s precise rollout plan. Voneus currently has networks in over 35 counties across England, Scotland and Wales.
Residential customers of their full fibre service pay from £34.99 per month (currently discounted to £29.99) on a 24-month term for their 250Mbps (symmetric speed) package with free installation, which rises to £59.99 for 900Mbps. The wireless package costs £34.99 per month too, but only offers speeds of 30-50Mbps. Most packages also offer the first 1-3 months of service for free.
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, BlueSky, Threads.net and Linkedin.
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God bless ye please don’t let my breathing connectipn go please this is really important it helps me to breath and I am able to go on wit my life but without this connection that helps me to breath I would SUFFERCATeed to a horrible way and be made to hold my breath also please don’t allow this ye are beautiful good people who I think the world of thank you Helen ❤️❤️❤️❤️
I think these guys are rolling out in Mountain Ash and Ferndale (and other places) in Rhondda Cynon Taf. Not seen any official announcements, but they’ve put planning permission into the local authority to install cabinets in a number of places.
https://planningonline.rctcbc.gov.uk/online-applications/applicationDetails.do?keyVal=_RHOND_DCAPR_62257&activeTab=summary
https://planningonline.rctcbc.gov.uk/online-applications/applicationDetails.do?keyVal=_RHOND_DCAPR_62260&activeTab=summary
Applicant addresses are for an address on Sugarswell Business Park, Shenington, Banbury which seems to be Voneous in a few Google searches.
I believe that is where one of their acquisitions was from – SugarNet.
They have nearly completed installing in Penkridge. They were at the local Market today and said people should be able to get connected at the end of Feb. I was told I would be able to get a deal on the 500Mbps package but wasn’t told a price. We shall see.
Voneous recently finished putting there pipework in our road ready for their FFTP cabling. Now Virgin are digging up the same pavements again to put their, different coloured, pipework in. We also appear on on Open Reach’s map for upgrade this year, so will they be doing the same? Why all this waste of time, money, materials and disruption, why not share the conduits? Also without Open Reach we will be stuck with a choice of one of two ISPs. Bonkers!