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The ITS Technology Group, which has built various open access full fibre broadband and Ethernet networks (“Faster Britain“) across urban parts of the UK for businesses and ISPs, has today announced a reciprocal partnership with retail provider Zen Internet and spoken of their ambition for future network expansion within the next 2 years.
Just to recap. The operator’s XGS-PON-enabled (10Gbps capable) full fibre network is currently said to “pass” almost 500,000 businesses (commercial premises – about 25% of the UK business market), and they often claim to “reach the rest” through their trusted operator partners’ infrastructure, which includes the likes of BTWholesale, Sky, PXC (TalkTalk), and Virgin Media Business etc.
Meanwhile, Zen Internet is typically a retail broadband ISP, but in recent months they’ve also launched the Fibre Hub (here), which essentially aggregates access to a number of major and smaller alternative full fibre broadband networks (Openreach, CityFibre, Trooli, Freedom Fibre etc.) and offers that access up to partners (e.g. other ISPs) at the wholesale level.
The new agreement means that Zen Internet will gain access to sell their products over ITS’ network, while ITS will also join Zen’s Fibre Hub and be able to sell their services to associated partners. For example, Zen and their partners will gain access to ITS’ Fibre Light and Fibre Bright solutions.
FibreLight delivers a leased line-type product (Ethernet over FTTP), offering speeds from 100Mbps right up to 5Gbps. FibreBright offers a fully uncontended and symmetrical Ethernet leased line service, from 100Mbps up to 10Gbps – built for data-intensive environments and cloud-first operations.
Richard Tang, CEO of Zen Internet, said:
“Our partnership with ITS allows us to extend our reach and provide unparalleled connectivity solutions to our channel partners as well as B2B clients, especially in areas where we previously did not have a footprint. We are excited about the opportunities this brings and are confident it will drive growth for both Zen and ITS. I’m particularly happy about this being a reciprocal partnership, with Zen selling services over ITS’s network, and ITS using Zen’s network to provide services where ITS has not yet built network footprint.”
Daren Baythorpe, CEO of ITS, said:
“This partnership shows two organisations working to deliver greater choice, value, and resilience to the UK business connectivity market. It also reflects the strategic alignment and mutual respect between two businesses committed to innovation, quality, and customer value.
We’re proud to support their expansion, just as Zen has supported ours. From pioneering network innovations like our 50G-PON trial, to this new wholesale agreement, we’re proving what’s possible when collaboration is underpinned by shared purpose and ambition.”
As part of this announcement, Richard Tang has also done another one of his famous altnet interviews with Daren, which you can see below. The interview itself is perhaps less interesting to those coming from more of a consumer perspective (most of our readership), but it does reveal a bit more detail about today’s deal, as well as ITS’ view of the wider market and their expansion plans.
For example, Daren reveals that they’re hoping to expand the reach of their own full fibre network from about 25% of UK businesses to 35% within the next 18-24 months, which he felt was a “reasonable target [to be] setting ourselves“.
In addition, Daren also hints that their recent 50G PON (50Gbps broadband) technology trial (here) could be followed by a commercial service launch of the new network and related services, which he said may occur during early 2026.