Virtual1 joins TalkTalk Group

Since entering the UK market in the early 2000s, TalkTalk has become the UK’s leading value-for-money connectivity provider and has a proud history as an innovative, challenger brand.

Today, TalkTalk Group provides fibre, broadband, TV, and landline services to over four million customers, and operates Britain’s biggest unbundled broadband network, covering 96% of the population.

As a leading network provider in the UK in our own right, Virtual1 becoming part of the TalkTalk Group is an exciting opportunity to significantly increase our scale as a national provider of Ethernet solutions, and to mutually strengthen the capabilities and market position of both businesses.

Together, Virtual1 and TalkTalk Group will achieve a combined Ethernet market share of 25%, further strengthening TalkTalk Group’s status as the UK’s fastest growing provider of high bandwidth services.

All of Virtual1’s Partners will be able to enjoy our unrivalled capabilities in automation, sophisticated API solutions and leading-edge portal experiences, in over 3000 Exchanges. Our Partners will now also be able to offer highly compelling Cloud and Connectivity services to their customers all across the UK. This represents a huge new opportunity to both the channel, and to UK businesses.

Whilst Virtual1 is entering into an agreement to become part of the TalkTalk Group, CEO and founder Tom O’Hagan will continue to lead Virtual1 as a standalone business, so the day-to-day experience that our Partners receive will continue as normal. We expect the transaction to complete by the end of May.

Following today’s news, our investment partner BGF, which has backed the business since 2016, will now exit the business. We would like to thank the team at BGF for all their support over the last five years. In addition, we would like to also thank Arma Partners who have acted as our exclusive financial advisor, alongside Latham & Watkins, as Legal Advisor, on our deal with TalkTalk Group.

Tristia Harrison, TalkTalk CEO, says “Since taking the company private in February 2021 we have looked to invest to strengthen both our B2B and wholesale platforms. As all businesses continue to experience increasing demands for high bandwidth services, we see huge benefits in acquiring Virtual1 coupling our national scale network with their market-leading APIs and software capabilities. Tom O’Hagan, CEO and founder, and his excellent team of 200 people will continue to lead the standalone business and we look forward to welcoming them to the TalkTalk family.”

Tom O’Hagan, Virtual1 Founder and CEO, says “15 years ago I sold my house and left my job to start my own business. Even with my big ambitions I must admit back then I never imagined what Virtual1 would become. I’m immensely proud of what the business has achieved and that we have built one of the largest wholesale providers for connectivity in the UK with a National network of almost 300 Unbundled exchanges. None of this would have been possible without the fantastic team I have around me and the amazing customers we are privileged to serve.

Today marks a very exciting new chapter in our journey. With our software smarts, and the scale of TalkTalk’s network, we are going to be an unstoppable force in the channel. This deal will change the market and I can’t wait to get stuck in helping our customers grow with game changing connectivity solutions on a network with 3000 exchanges.”