Rapidly growing, business focused telecoms firm Complete Networks is to invest between €3m and €4m in the year ahead rolling out 200km of fibre networks to reach businesses across Ireland.
The company, which last year raised €4m from former SmartForce boss Bill McCabe’s Oyster Capital, already owns 100km of fibre networks, including ducting, which connect data centres and businesses.
The existing networks connect to eNet’s 27 Metropolitan Area Networks (MANs) and Complete Networks managing director Kevin Murphy says the new investment will bring fibre directly to strategic customers around Ireland.
“We started Complete around the time that fibre had fallen in value and we went out and acquired fibre and ducts. The part we actually own is a metropolitan network with 144 fibre cores. We own enough fibre that we actually sell it to other broadband providers on a wholesale basis.”
Murphy said that Complete Networks is specifically tailored to suit the needs of large and SME businesses. “We are totally unique in the sense that because we understand business applications and have a grounding in the local area network (LAN) world, we can bring a greater depth of knowledge to the table, specifically in terms of the general move to IP communications.”
Prior to the €4m investment by Bill McCabe’s Oyster Capital, Complete has been stealthily building up a significant customer base including pharamecuticals firm Astellas and Anglo Irish Bank.
“We have a strong relationship with eNet and in Cork, for example, we are connecting up all the hospitals in the city with Ethernet.”
Murphy said the company has no interest in moving into the residential broadband market. “We can connect up all the various data centres around the city and have sold 1Gbps connections to government departments, banks and healthcare providers.
“Our network can start at 10Mbps and go to 10Gbps – the sweet spot for us is in the range of 100Mbps to 1Gbps.”
Murphy said that Complete Networks’s future plans for 2008 are to become better known as a brand and focus on a greater reach into the SME segment.
“We will be rolling fibre out to individual customer sites and then rolling out a national network that will connect the regions together. This will involve an additional 200km of fibre.”
Murphy said Complete Networks has been profitable since its inception in 2001. In terms of revenues, the company achieved sales of €9m in 2007 and is targeting revenues of €14m this year.
Complete has offices in Dublin, Limerick, Cork and Belfast and employs 30 people.
By John Kennedy
