‘We’re here to stay!’

Local management buy out Arden Eurona Broadband

The future of one of the Ireland fastest growing broadband brands is back in Irish hands after local management led a buyout of the business.

Based in Cavan and Roscommon, Arden and Brisknet were established in 2007 with a particular focus on pioneering the delivery of reliable high-speed, next generation broadband services to rural parts of the country.

In 2013, Spanish-owned Eurona (later Global Satellite Technologies SL) acquired Arden and Brisnet, further bolstering the company's capabilities and reach.

“We had very good amicable relationship with them for almost 12 years,” says Barry Wilson, the Belturbet entrepreneur who founded Arden nearly two decades ago.

“It was a very productive relationship. We joined [with Eurona] when we needed to, to scale up as we had ambitions to do back then. We are where we are now because of that relationship. In 2013, we were selling three meg broadband. Now we're selling 150MB broadband on fixed wireless. We're also offering 500, 1,000, and 2,000 on fibre. So the sky is the limit. But we needed their input, that impetus, and we needed that boost of confidence to get the business to the next level," he explained of the journey.

In January 2021 Eurona Arden became the first retailer in Ireland to connect a premises on NBI's fibre rollout under the National Broadband Plan. That was Wayne Allison from the Kilmore area, and it was the first step to bringing connectivity to one in five rural family farms.

But last year, an opportunity presented to purchase elements of the Madrid headquartered Eurona business.

“There were interested parties in the company here in Ireland as well says Barry, who engaged his fellow Arden shareholders - Carmel Brady and Paul Cullen - in launching a Management Buyout (MBO).

“Talks” took place over the past four months, with an undisclosed deal agreed.

“The deal is closed,” says Barry confidently. “We've been treated very well. They can see we're serious. They also see we know the business as well as anyone can. For us, taking that leap of faith, we see the business has a decent customer portfolio, a robust product portfolio, and together that shapes up for a good future.”

If there was any evidence needed as to the demand for such services, it's the fall-out from Storm Éowyn, which left 270,000 subscribers without broadband.

In the most severely affected areas, repairs took longer than the 10 to 14 days initially expected due to the huge complexity of damage caused by one of the most extreme weather events to hit Ireland in recent memory.

“The actual service provider is NBI, but they failed to deliver for weeks on end on their platform. As a company we were somewhere caught in the middle. We found our customers were in the worst cases going seven and eight weeks without service. We were still being charged at our end, so we looked at how we could step in.”

Even as a small operation in relative terms, Barry says Arden was uniquely positioned to pivot action repair efforts as required.

“It doesn't take us long to figure out which way to move, and address where there's a problem. We compete really on service at the end of the day, and that's what we excel at. People don't want to be ignored when they call about a problem. They just want a date and time for when it'll be fixed. They pay for a service and they want to be treated with basic respect.”

As a result Arden and Brisnet took on hundreds of new customers from other fibre providers across the country after the storm.

“I mean, you're looking around the country at wires hanging down. It takes ages to knit that all back together again. But for us, once the ESB started getting power back up again, we were following on their heels making sure our gear was still fully operational. To be able to do that gave us a huge lift.”

With the Eurona buy-back across the line, Arden and Brisnet are now planning a rebrand.

“At the end of the day, together we have a customer base all over Ireland. We've grown the business since 2007 from zero to where we are now, and see a very good upward trajectory for the coming years. There are others who have come into the market and gone just as quick. We're here to stay,” says Barry, who paid tribute to the dedication of his staff.

“We're a solid business, and that's because of them. Wireless product is evolving leaps and bounds. We have a bright future ahead of us I feel.”