Virgin Media Will Acquire Wireless Hotspot Specialist Arqiva WiFi

Virgin Media will acquire Wi-Fi hotspot specialist Arqiva WiFi in a bid to boost its outdoor wireless network reach and connectivity for its customers.

Once the deal is complete, Virgin Media claims it will have access to the 31,000 Wi-Fi access points provided by Arqiva WiFi across 6,500 UK locations, which will build upon Virgin’s own Wi-Fi network which includes 250 London Underground stations.

The acquisition will see Arqiva WiFi being brought into Virgin’s corporate fold to become part of Virgin Media Business.

Wireless hotspots

The Arqiva WiFi hotspot network pipes wireless broadband access to locations such as hotel rooms, motorway service stations and airports. By gaining access to this network Virgin can extend bring its internet services to all these hotspots and extend beyond being a broadband provider to what it claims will be one of the UK’s largest public Wi-Fi providers.

“By complementing our existing offer with the acquisition of one of the UK’s biggest and best public WiFi providers we’ll soon be able to expand the same high quality connectivity outdoors. In today’s digital age connectivity matters, whether you are at home, at work or on the go,” said Peter Kelly, managing director at Virgin Media Business.

Arqiva WiFi has been part of Arqiva, which not only specialises in outdoor wireless hotspots but also works on providing Wi-Fi networks for businesses and has been investing in 5G infrastructure for the UK.

Selling-off its Wi-Fi division to Virgin will also Arqiva enter into an agreement with Virgin to continue with the deployment of public Wi-Fi services in its street concessions, as well as set Arqiva as the exclusive partner for the provision of indoor Wi-Fi to Virgin Media and Virgin Media Businesses customers.

“Virgin Media is a strong match for our customers given its extensive experience of the WiFi market, both in-home and outdoor. These new agreements will enable both Virgin Media and Arqiva to leverage their respective strengths to deliver innovative and compelling solutions to customers where the need for capacity and coverage is ever increasing,” said Nicolas Ott, managing director, Telecoms and M2M at Arqiva.

Slicing and selling-off parts of a company is the done thing at the moment with Intel splitting its Security division into an new McAfee business and HPE selling some of its software assets to UK firm Micro Focus.