CityFibre has announced the acquisition of TalkTalk’s internet business FibreNation for £200 million.
The acquisition has led to CityFibre increasing its planned fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) rollout target of five million premises up to eight million and its total investment programme reaching £4 billion.
The deal means CityFibre will add TalkTalk as a big wholesale customer across both consumer and business markets.
FibreNation was initially founded in 2018 as part of a joint venture between TalkTalk, Sky and CityFibre, and was launched to deploy full fibre across York, with around 49,000 premises currently connected.
FibreNation also has projects under way in Harrogate and Dewsbury, plus Knaresborough and Ripon, with three million homes and businesses targeted for full-fibre broadband.
CityFibre’s acquisition will also grow the Gigabit City Investment Programme in more than 100 towns and cities, with an estimated 7,000 construction jobs to be generated outside of London.
CityFibre’s CEO Greg Mesch has said the deal consolidates CityFibre’s place as the third national digital infrastructure platform.
“Digital connectivity has the power to transform our country into a nation of smart, connected towns and cities, boosting and levelling up our economy.
“This announcement establishes CityFibre as the UK’s third national digital infrastructure platform allowing millions more consumers and businesses to benefit from access to faster, more reliable services.”
TalkTalk chief executive Tristia Harrison said the agreement is “good news” for both TalkTalk and for the UK’s full-fibre rollout.
“Our investment over the last five years and the excellent work delivered by the FibreNation team, combined with CityFibre’s well-established platform, will support wide-geographical reach of full-fibre and further drive competition and customer take-up in the market.”
The deal remains subject to approval from TalkTalk shareholders.
