There’s no stopping the rural full fibre provider Gigaclear as they hit 100,000 connected customers! There are only a handful of ‘altnets’ that surpass the 100,000 connected customer mark, and Gigaclear can now proudly wear that badge.
Not only that, the network & ISP have now passed 500,000 properties!
It’s clear that this altnet is thriving; they’ve clearly got the recipe right when marketing to its footprint. They’ve gone from 36,000 customers in 2021, with 140,000 properties passed, to now six digits connected and half a million passed. The growth has been supported by two funding rounds; in June, they secured a funding commitment of up to £420m from global investor Equitix. Then, as a further bonus, six months later, they had entered into a new debt facility of up to £1.5bn with a consortium of banks
CEO Nathan Rundle said “whilst the milestones marked the end of one chapter in Gigaclear’s growth story, a new one was already underway that would see the UK’s largest rural alternative network provider reach over one million premises in 2027.”
Nathan said the company would double-down on its mission to create a unique, full fibre broadband network that would help generate economic and social value to ultra rural communities whose only other option was their existing slow copper connection.
He added: “It’s about giving people choice, something many of those living in small, often hard-to-reach rural communities currently don’t have. Our full fibre broadband fundamentally changes many of the communities we go to because it enables people to decide how they want to work and how they want to live their lives. It’s a choice many don’t have until we come along.”
Helping accelerate delivery of the company’s mission were two funding announcements last year. In June, Gigaclear secured a funding commitment of up to £420m from global investor Equitix followed, six months later, by an announcement it had entered into a new debt facility of up to £1.5bn with a consortium of banks.
Nathan said: “It’s reassuring to know that as we travel towards our target of reaching more than one million rural properties in 2027, the funding we secured last year demonstrates that investors are happy to join us on this journey. It’s going to be a very exciting period for Gigaclear.”
In celebration, Gigaclear put together a video with a real “rural/local feel”.
