Wildanet Become First UK Full Fibre AltNet to be B-Corp Certified
Rural broadband ISP Wildanet, which is busy building a new Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) network across parts of rural Cornwall and Devon in England, has today announced that they’ve become the first alternative network in the United Kingdom to be certified as a “B Corporation” (i.e. meeting key social and environmental standards).
In case anybody is unfamiliar with what being certified as a B Corporation actually means. In short, this reflects for-profit companies that have committed to create a positive impact on society and the environment through their operations (i.e. businesses that want to do some good in the world, beyond simply making profit).
At present there are known to be over 8,000 Certified B Corporations in more than 93 countries around the world, including over 1,750 here in the UK (e.g. Ben & Jerry’s, Patagonia, Zen Internet, iDNET, Innocent Drinks). The certification requires firms to meet strict standards of social and environmental performance, accountability, and transparency.
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The latest to join that club today, and the first UK AltNet, is Wildanet, which previously said they were expecting to add more than 50,000 rural ready for service (RFS) premises to their full fibre network by the end of 2023. This is in addition to the c. 60,000 reportedly covered by their fixed wireless network. Wildanet also holds the £36m Project Gigabit contract to cover another 19,250 premises in remote rural parts of Cornwall (here).
Helen Wylde-Archibald, CEO of Wildanet, said:
“We are delighted and very proud to be recognised as a Certified B Corp and to be leading the way for UK AltNets. Wildanet’s founding mission, our ethos and operation is steeped in responsibility and sustainability. It is about working with and supporting communities in Cornwall and the South West, seeking to balance looking after the environment, looking after people, and growing a successful and profitable long-term business.
Achieving B Corp certification acknowledges this and reflects the hard work and dedication of the entire Wildanet team in ensuring we not only bring transformational broadband and digital connectivity services to the communities we serve but do so as a sustainable business delivering wider benefits for society and our environment.”
In addition to gaining B Corp certification, Wildanet’s commitment to sustainability and good practice also saw the company honoured in 2023 with a number of major regional and industry awards; including being named Most Sustainable Large Business at the Cornwall Sustainability Awards; winning the Sustainability Award at the Connected Britain Awards for the B-23 initiative; and a Cornwall Chamber of Commerce award for Greenest Business.
Admittedly some may view all this as a form of virtue signalling, but on the other hand it’s nice to have practical business virtues worth signalling in the first place, as opposed to none.
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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This is a nothing burger, bcorp is just a company funded by ESG. Corporate communism nonsense
Completely agree, just PR and marketing, doesn’t mean anything at all, except they are more into marketing than they are their staff and customers.
Agree totally. DEI = Discrimination, Exclusion and Indoctrination.
Very true! You don’t have to get any certification before you can do what you consider ‘good’. The reason to get this ‘corporate jewellery’ is to signal that you are part of the ‘in crowd’. That you fully sign up to the DEI / Davos / neo-Marxist / Common Purpose agenda. People are now awake to what is going on.
Shame that I have a wildanet full fibre box less then 10 yards from my house but can not get connected…….
Ah yes Ben and Jerry’s “strict standard social performance” of *checks notes”…..
– profiting from migrant CHILD exploitation
– refusing to sell their product to the Jews
– posting on 4th of July that “America exists on stolen land” and refusing to give the land BJ owns away to who they think should own it
Every company with this evil paganistic cult adherence certification not only needs to be laughed at, they need to be actively boycotted
Wow, the comments are something else.
Good, it means people are waking up.
Always are on things like this. Always the same people posting them, too.
Why so many angry that a for-profit company is committing to ensure they have a positive impact on society and the environment. Got to be better than not giving a sh!t about society and the environment.
B Corp Certifed businesses meet standards of validated performance, accountability, and transparency across various things like employee benefits and charitable contributions and supply chain practices.
@bob, as others have said it is a sham certification that really means nothing and b-labs do nothing to remove or investigate companies who have the status and don’t meet the standards.
BrewDog kept their status despite the serious issues in their culture in 2021 which were a clear breach of b-corp status.
I had the misfortune of working for a certified company, again the way they treated staff and other issues were totally against their status but they carried on and nothing was done by b-labs. It seems you pay your money self certify and you get a nice logo.
@Anon Brewdog today opted not to meet one of its requirements.