Customers of Sky Broadband’s (Sky plc) various UK broadband, phone and Pay TV products are being told to brace for an average annual price hike of 8.1% (£5.60), which is to be introduced from 1st April 2023. But crucially, this is less than the 14-15% of their main competitors and below the current level of […]

Startup Story

Whilst new to the telecom sector, Pilot Round believes it can make a difference in the startup space for the sector. They will be joining Total Telecom at Connected North in Manchester in April.

Tell us about your start up
Pilot Round is a new, powerful FounderTech platform built to bridge the gap between pre-product founders and appropriate early-stage investors. Through an intuitive mobile application, founders can quickly onboard and provide details on how much of their Pilot Round they are looking to secure in order to fund their next 3-6 months. They then use the seamlessly integrated AI of ChatGPT to help prepare a compelling script around their founder’s journey, which they then can rehearse, present and record via the camera on their phone.

What is your USP, how do you stand out from your competition?
Unlike other founder investor platforms we powerfully enable pre-product founders in their early stage to leverage their Founder Market Fit to find aligned investors that are interested in funding and fuelling their next 3-6 months

Why did you establish the business?
After being a founder myself, I have spent over a decade pioneering how Founder Market Fit can be modelled, analysed and evaluated in early stage conversations

Who inspired you / who is your mentor or motivation?
Chamath Palihapitiya {a Silicon Valley venture capital investor described by Forbes as a tech firebrand.}

What does the future hold for your business?
We hope to make Pilot Round the go-to market pre-seed platform, format and standard in the early stage space.

COMPANY CV

HEADQUARTERS – LONDON
NUMBER OF EMPLOYEES – 3
LAST FUNDING TYPE – PRE-SEED
WEBSITE URL – www.pilotround.com
FOUNDER: Dan Simmons

If you want to showcase your startup at Connected North, apply on the website or email startup manager *********@*******le.com“>Amie Tucker

 

Mobile network operator Smarty has quietly added the ‘SMARTY Social Tariff‘ to their website, which as the name suggests is a low-cost unlimited data (mobile broadband), calls and texts (SMS) plan that is only available to those on eligible state benefits and costs just £12 per month. Smarty, which is a Mobile Virtual Network Operator […]

Press Release

Fern Trading Limited today announced that it is consolidating Jurassic Fibre, Swish Fibre, Giganet and AllPoints Fibre into a single Fibre To The Premises (FTTP) operating entity to accelerate full-fibre delivery in the UK.

The combined group’s Internet Service Provider (ISP) brands will accelerate delivery of a ‘fast and fair’ full fibre offering for retail customers across the enlarged network.

The businesses will combine their regional operations and create a national wholesale network during the course of 2023.

The industry has seen considerable investment and growth in recent years as operators build market momentum and value. The unification of the four businesses will enable them to combine their resources, knowledge and expertise to hasten and grow full fibre network access across the UK.

Jarlath Finnegan, currently CEO of Giganet, will lead the combined group moving forward. He said: “All four companies are excited to build upon the solid foundations they have built over the last few years as a combined force. Together, we will become even stronger through exceptional customer service, combined with a relentless focus on technology and product. We’re looking forward to expanding our presence across the country and providing even more customers with access to full fibre connectivity”.

John Browett, chairman of Fern Trading’s fibre division, said: “In the coming years, the UK fibre market is going to experience exponential change, driven by the massive need to ensure homes and businesses in every part of the UK have access to a fast and fairly priced internet service. We expect to see continued consolidation within the industry, and by combining these successful businesses now, we will be in a fantastic position to take advantage of those market opportunities as they unfold. Our ambitions have always been high, but today represents the start of even bolder aspirations for our place in the UK fibre sector”.

How is the UK’s altnet landscape changing in 2023? Join the discussion with the operators themselves at this year’s Connected North conference live in Manchester

Also in the news:
Comcast signs deals worth $50m with State of Indiana for rural fibre expansion
Verizon records 5G upload speeds of over 1Gbps
Yorkshire Water partners with BT for smart water project

In a major development, investment firm Fern Trading has just announced that several of their full fibre broadband ISPs and networks (i.e. those where they hold a majority stake) – including Jurassic Fibre, Swish Fibre, Giganet (Cuckoo) and AllPoints Fibre – are to be consolidated into a single Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) operating entity. Regular readers might […]

London-focused broadband ISP CommunityFibre, which is building a Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) network to cover 2.2 million UK premises by the end of 2024, has launched a new promotion that’s specifically targeted at Virgin Media’s customers in the city (e.g. 920Mbps for £27/month with 1 month free). The provider, which currently covers over 720,000 premises in the […]

News

The Dutch operator group has finally agreed to exit the Russian market via a sale of the unit to its executive leadership team

Ever since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February last year, Veon has found itself in the unenviable position of owning mobile operators on both sides of the conflict.

In Russia, the Dutch company wholly owns Vimpelcom, Russia’s third-largest operator, which accounts for around half of Veon’s total revenues. Meanwhile, in Ukraine, it owns Kyivstar, the country’s largest operator.

Naturally, this convoluted situation has created a litany of challenges for Veon over the past year, with the company having seen its share price plunge by around 60% since the war began.

But while Veon indicated relatively early on in the conflict that it would like to follow numerous other firms in exiting the Russian market, doing so has proved problematic.

It was only after many months of debate, in November last year, that Veon announced it had struck a deal with a group of Vimpelcom’s executive leadership team, agreeing to sell the business to them for around $1.83 billion.

The group, lead by current Vimpelcom CEO Aleksander Torbakhov, said that they had presented Veon with the “most balanced offer” in what they called the “competitive process of selling the asset”. However, it should be noted here that Veon had previously valued the business at roughly $5 billion, hence the purchase represents a significant discount.

Nonetheless, Veon CEO Kaan Terzioglu at the time commented that the deal was the “optimal solution” for the company.

The Russian government, however, seemingly disagreed, with reports late last month suggesting that the buyout was opposed by the Russian finance ministry, economy ministry, and the central bank. According to sources, initial drafts of the deal had been rejected and sent back to involved parties for renegotiation.

Now, Veon has announced that it has obtained approval from required regulators, with the deal expected to close this summer.

“We are pleased to have reached this significant milestone in the transaction, which is expected to be accretive to equity, reduce VEON’s debt, and improve its credit profile,” said Terzioglu.

Want to keep up with all the of the latest news from the international telecoms community? Click here to receive Total Telecom’s daily newsletter

Also in the news:
Comcast signs deals worth $50m with State of Indiana for rural fibre expansion
Verizon records 5G upload speeds of over 1Gbps
Yorkshire Water partners with BT for smart water project

Little-known ISP Open Fibre, which for the past few years has been selling broadband packages in Hull via MS3′s new Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP / XGS-PON) broadband network, has extended their agreement so that they can now serve those being covered by the latest network expansion across the North East of England. MS3 started rolling out their […]

CityFibre has announced that their £46m project to deploy a new Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) based UK broadband ISP network across Harrogate, Ripon and Knaresborough in North Yorkshire has now gone live for “thousands of premises“, including in Bilton, Woodlands, Rossett Green, Pannal, Valley Gardens and New Park. The rollout in Harrogate is currently expected to “reach […]

News

With revenue growth slowing and profits falling, Zoom says it is taking proactive measures to ensure the future viability of the business

This week, video conferencing company Zoom has become the latest in a string of major tech firms to announce major job cuts, citing the pressure of the global economy post-pandemic.

Zoom is laying off around 15% of its staff – roughly 1,300 people – as part of a wider restructure aimed designed at eliminating duplicative roles.

“As the world transitions to life post-pandemic, we are seeing that people and businesses continue to rely on Zoom,” CEO Eric Yuan wrote in a message to staff. “But the uncertainty of the global economy, and its effect on our customers, means we need to take a hard – yet important – look inward to reset ourselves so we can weather the economic environment, deliver for our customers and achieve Zoom’s long-term vision.”

Yuan said that the company has “worked tirelessly” but admits that it had made “mistakes”, particularly with regards to scaling up sustainably.

He announced he would take a pay cut of 98% for the next fiscal year and forgo his bonus.

Bloomberg suggests that Yuan’s base salary for the last financial year was $301,731, though his total compensation was reportedly closer to $1.1 million.

Other executive staff will also take a 20% pay cut and lose bonuses.

The covid pandemic jettisoned Zoom into the public zeitgeist back in 2020, with the rapid shift to home working quickly making the brand a household name. That year, the company saw its revenues triple, further increasing in 2021 by an additional 55%. Over this period, the company’s workforce also increased three-fold to meet the soaring demand.

By 2022, however, the pandemic was rapidly becoming a thing of the past for many markets around the world and work habits were reverting accordingly. Zoom saw its revenue growth slow to a single-digit crawl, with profits falling by 38%.

With share prices having similarly fallen around 80% from their mid-pandemic high, it should come as no surprise that the company is taking drastic measures to restructure.

It should be noted, however, that Zoom is not the only company looking to streamline its operations in recent months in the wake of the economic downturn. According to tracking data compiled by Layoffs.fyi, over 100,000 tech workers have been laid off this year, with Google, Meta, Microsoft, Amazon, and Salesforce

Indeed, earlier this week Dell announced that it was following suit, revealing plans to lay off around 5% of its global workforce, around 6,650 people.

How is the global economic downturn affecting the US telecoms industry? Join the operators in discussion at this year’s live Connected America conference

Also in the news:
Comcast signs deals worth $50m with State of Indiana for rural fibre expansion
Verizon records 5G upload speeds of over 1Gbps
Yorkshire Water partners with BT for smart water project