Fibre network provider Venus Business Communications has been bought by the UK’s fastest growing internet infrastructure firm Metronet, as part of its push into the London market.
The acquisition of follows the £47.5m purchase of M247 in October 2016, and will add a further six data centres to its UK network.
Venus will provide the group with access to the strategically important London market as it seeks to build a national disruptive platform with ‘last mile’ control, faster connectivity and a powerful transit network across Europe.
Metronet’s network is now connected to all key strategic UK data centre locations as well as 14 of the world’s largest and most important Internet exchanges.
Founded in 2005 by Brian Iddon and Justin Keery, Venus covers all of central London and the City, providing superfast, high speed fibre at up to 10 gigabit/sec.
This is almost 100 times quicker than the leading alternative broadband connection.
The combined Group will now employ around 230 people across six sites including Manchester, Newcastle, London and Bucharest.
It will support almost 34,000 customers across 92 countries, from SMEs to Enterprise clients including Intu, On The Beach, Sofology and ao.com, and deliver revenues of nearly £50m.
Lee Perkins, chief executive at Metronet, said, “Venus is a fantastic business which has established itself as a leading player in the London market thanks to its market leading levels of speed and reliability.
“Just as importantly, Venus has the same entrepreneurial and customer-centric culture as us so I have no doubt that it will be an excellent fit with our business.”
Brian Iddon, director and founder at Venus, added, “I am immensely proud of the business we have built over the past 12 years and am excited about what we will be able to achieve as part of the Group’s wider offer.
“I have known Lee and the team for a number of years and feel that Metronet are the perfect fit for us as we look to build on the strong momentum we have generated to date.”