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Swish Fibre funding unlocks £250m investment in UK full-fibre and job creation
December 17th, 2019.
Swish Fibre Ltd has today announced a long-term funding deal that unlocks its ambitious plans to transform full-fibre broadband access in the UK and help boost the nation’s coverage levels from 34th position to number one in the world rankings.
Work will now commence on the build of Swish Fibre’s first state-of-the-art 10 Gigabit per second full-fibre network, enabling 250,000 properties in the Home Counties to enjoy world leading speeds. Initially focussing on locations within commutable distance from London, further announcements about specific build locations will be made public soon.
Fern Trading Limited (“Fern”), advised by Octopus Investments (“Octopus”), has acquired Swish Fibre. With growth plans that will see investment in excess of £250m over the next few years, Swish Fibre is now poised to create vital UK infrastructure to serve the data consumption needs of future generations. These plans will also generate a significant volume of new jobs over the next decade.
Swish Fibre is an established Openreach Communications Provider and obtained Code Powers earlier in 2019. During the build phase, Swish Fibre will use a combination of Openreach PIA ducts and poles, along with a newly-built ducted network to deliver its full-fibre broadband service. Plans are on track to be ‘breaking ground’ during the first quarter of 2020.
Sharing the same customer-centric vision with Fern, Swish Fibre is now extremely well placed to realise its ‘beyond broadband’ vision for better connected people, businesses and services across the UK. Swish Fibre was advised in this transaction by Cameron Barney.
Brice Yharrassarry, CEO of Swish Fibre, said:
“We are delighted that Fern, advised by Octopus, has agreed to acquire Swish Fibre and to support our agreed roll-out plans to bring fibre optic broadband to hundreds of thousands of new customers across the Home Counties.”
Paul Latham, CEO of Fern, said:
“Swish Fibre has exciting plans to invest into the infrastructure of local economies in the UK and provide a substantial upgrade to the digital connectivity of communities. It’s a perfect match for Fern, which has a track record of backing experienced management teams to turn such ambitions into reality and provide long term stable returns for its investors.”
Robert Skinner, Investment Director at Octopus, commented:
“We’re looking forward to working with the Swish Fibre team as they build fibre networks over the coming years for customers who are crying out for better broadband.”
If you would like more information about this topic, please e-mail PR@swishfibre.com.
