Indigo in 2020: acquisitions, growth and ambition

Indigo Telecom Group in 2020: acquisitions, growth and ambition

By Kevin Taylor, Executive Chairman, Indigo Telecom Group

2020

A year that will live long in the memory for every single one of us. With a new year on the horizon, this time of year offers the opportunity for reflection.

Despite it being such a challenging year, what has made me proud is the role the telecoms sector has played during the pandemic. Delivering connectivity for home workers and people unable to see their family and friends has made me glad to be part of this industry. Our staff quickly adjusted to new procedures to keep themselves and the community safe and SLA performance remained at 99.99%.

For Indigo Telecom Group, 2020 has become one of the most significant in our history. Here are some of the highlights:

The acquisition of 4site

We announced the acquisition of 4site in December 2019, which complemented Indigo Telecom Group’s core expertise in the supply of multi-vendor telecom support services. With design and planning expertise in delivering specialist fibre and mobile wireless services, integrating 4site into the group this year has enabled us to offer even more services to our customers.

It’s also been fantastic to welcome 4site’s 100+ employees to the team. It really feels like we’re building something special.

Growth ambitions

In the summer, we announced the group was entering into a new phase of growth through further acquisition and workforce expansion. These plans include expanding our network design, build and support capabilities across the UK, Ireland, France and Germany. In 2021, we will push ahead with our global expansion plans and open operations in the USA, Spain and Singapore. You can read more about this from my interview with Capacity Magazine.

Throughout 2020, we have seen significant growth across a number of key areas of our business – fibre and wireless design/build/support and data centre transformation. The goal is to continue with our acquisition strategy and recruit more talent to strengthen our position as a trusted engineering and services partner to our customers.

Key hires

To support our ambitions in 2020 and beyond, we committed to building an executive team to be reckoned with – a team tasked with taking the business onto the next phase of growth. In July, we announced two senior additions to the leadership team: our new Chief Commercial Officer, Chris Newall, and Mark Orchart, our Group Product and Bid Director.

With 20+ years each in the telecoms sector respectively with the likes of Ciena, Ericsson and Alcatel, Chris and Mark bring a huge amount of experience and knowledge to our team at a time when we are scaling up operations.

Recruiting talent

Throughout this year, we have consistently brought new talent onboard across all levels – and in 2021 that will continue. We have signed up to support the Armed Forces Covenant in the UK and we have been awarded the Investors in People Gold accreditation.

In total, we have hired 120 people and starting from January we will be increasing our recruitment in speed and intensity.  This will be in partnership with IDA Ireland – but I can’t give too much away just yet…

Industry recognition

With our headquarters in Magor, Wales we were again thrilled to be recognised as one of the fastest-growing Welsh firms in 2020. Last year we received the same accolade and we are delighted to continue to grow even in these challenging times.

The Wales Fast Growth 50 is the definitive guide to the fastest growing indigenous firms in the Welsh economy.

We were also recognised as one of the UK’s best performing privately-owned technology companies by Megabuyte50.

A look ahead at 2021

How will 5G evolve? What will the Killer App be? Will we see further market consolidation within telecoms?

The year ahead may well answer the above questions, as well as asking many more. For a company like ours operating within the telecoms sector, 2021 is expected to be even busier. That’s what unites and excites the whole of the Indigo Telecom Group family.