Ogi, the “altnet” bringing ultrafast full fibre to Welsh residents (on a completely separate note, I love how Ogi’s domain uses .wales), has announced the success of reaching two-thirds of its planned “first phase” rollout. This means that one in five “properties passed” have signed up to use one of their full fibre packages.
Ogi is an “altnet” that both lays the fibre cable and connects the customers within the same brand.
Now, hitting 20% penetration on your footprint is not easy, and to be honest, only a handful of altnets have achieved this.
That’s not to say that the other altnets are not succeeding; they may focus more on properties passed than penetrating. But as an industry rule, keeping on top of your penetration rate keeps the investors happy. (further in the article, you’ll read how Ogi purposely made an effort to focus on penetration)
In 2021, Ogi burst into the altnet space with an ambitious £200 million plan to fast-track full fibre to south Wales, bypassing the sluggish pace of the incumbent operators (Openreach).
Come 2024, Ogi shifted gears, prioritizing customer take-up by offering competitive pricing and shorter-term contracts (told you it was coming). This strategy proved effective, drawing in thousands of customers to make the switch to full fibre, particularly in areas like Pembrokeshire and the post-industrial towns of the south Wales valleys.
Thanks to this fresh approach, Ogi has gained a significant first-mover advantage, reflected in its sector-leading high customer satisfaction score. This success follows targeted investments in back-office operations and customer service, including extending service hours to seven days a week and revamping online resources earlier this year.
Amid rising competition from the UK’s largest telcos, increasing build costs, and other market pressures, the Gigabit-capable provider continues to see customer adoption increase, with one in five joining the network in 2023, with places like Pembrokeshire seeing double that rate of growth.
Chief Executive Officer, Ben Allwright, said: “With one in five of the premises we can serve already signed up to Ogi, it’s clear to see we’re investing in the right places. Passing the 100,000 premises milestone – two thirds of our initial plan, completed – and seeing the massive benefits from this technology as adoption increases is encouraging.
“Putting our ISP operations first since the start of the year and harnessing the build machine as a tool for growth has allowed us to take a breath and make sure we’re doing the right things for our customers and long-term sustainability. While we might not be as visible installing new network as we had been – we’ve been busy in the background, supporting our existing customer base and welcoming thousands more every month.
“We’re building something really exciting here at Ogi; and the people of Wales are invested in our journey to create a real challenger brand – one that Wales can be proud of, and others are already envious of.”
The network is currently being rolled out in around 60 towns and villages across south Wales, with thousands of customers joining the full fibre ISP every month. The Wales-based telco offers broadband and phone services for home and a suite of IT, connectivity, and security options for business, with a new wholesale opportunity recently added to the portfolio [2024] for high-capacity users.
