Technology advances and growing demand for high-speed internet access are leading independent broadband firms to feel overwhelmingly positive about the future, according to a survey measuring confidence in the sector.<\/p>\n
Despite reports of their imminent demise, UK \u2018altnet\u2019 companies are expecting a boom in business over the next 12 months with 83 per cent of decision makers expecting strong growth in the coming year, the first Altnet Confidence Index found. Of the 300 surveyed decision makers from ISPs, network operators, and equipment and technology vendors, 23 per cent of that number predict significant growth. When looking ahead to five years, 77 per cent anticipate growth over that time.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere has been a view for some time now that the UK\u2019s alternative broadband sector was in decline,\u201d commented Proactive International PR CEO James Page. \u201cWith investors demanding to see returns on their investment and customers\u2019 unwillingness to pay substantially higher prices for higher speed services, the future seemed to consist only of mergers, acquisitions and a sharply diminishing number of companies remaining in the market. As a B2B tech PR and marketing agency with deep experience in the fibre and broadband market, we wanted to gauge how the sector was feeling \u2013 and the results are surprising.\u201d<\/p>\n
The optimistic outlook means companies are ready to spend, with 77 per cent of respondents planning to increase their investment over the next year, compared to the last 12 months. \u2018Sustainability\u2019 was the biggest priority for investment (39 per cent), even above network build, on which 25 per cent of respondents planned to spend.<\/p>\n
Commissioned by Proactive International PR in partnership with Censuswide, the Altnet Confidence Index 2025 provides an in-depth look at the alternative broadband sector, assessing its ability to grow, looking at where planned investment is focused and revealing the real view on consolidation in the industry.<\/p>\n
For companies expecting growth, \u2018Technological advancements\u2019 were cited as the biggest driver by nearly half of respondents (45 per cent), while \u2018Private equity and investor interest\u2019 and \u2018Increased demand for high-speed internet\u2019 each gave 35 per cent of professionals reason to be positive. Other reasons given included \u2018Competitive differentiation and market gaps\u2019 (33 per cent), Fibre rollout and infrastructure expansion\u2019 (33 per cent) and Resilience of the industry\u2019 (30 per cent).<\/p>\n
Despite the positivity, there are still causes for concern. \u2018Rising operational costs\u2019 worry 37 per cent of respondents, as do \u2018Increased regulatory pressures.\u2019 A further 31 per cent of respondents said \u2018Consolidation of smaller players reducing opportunities\u2019 was a concern.<\/p>\n
However, the overall view on consolidation was favourable, with 70 per cent of decision makers describing it as impacting their business very or somewhat positively.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe brief for this survey was well suited to Censuswide as we can poll very specific audiences to achieve interesting narratives, as we see here,\u201d said Censuswide\u2019s Head of Client Services Lucy Stewart. \u201cThe findings were varied but overall, they followed some key themes. For example, when we looked at confidence and growth outlook there was a lot of optimism, both in the short and longer term. It\u2019s really interesting to see that respondents are feeling so optimistic and we can dive into the data to look at some of the reasons for this.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Technology advances and growing demand for high-speed internet access are leading independent broadband firms to feel overwhelmingly positive…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7910,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[1638,86,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-7909","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-internet","tag-internet","tag-technology","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7909"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7909\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}