TalkTalk has entered into an agreement to acquire Virtual1, a wholesaler of high bandwidth services.
The Salford-headquartered group, which returned to private hands in a £1.1bn deal in March 2021, said the deal is an "exciting opportunity" for it to increase scale as a national provider of ethernet (also known as EAD or leased line) services and to "strengthen its capabilities and market position".
Virtual1 CEO and founder Tom O’Hagan will continue to lead the standalone business of 200 people as part of the TalkTalk Group.
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TalkTalk CEO Tristia Harrison said: "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 Virtual 1 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."
Mr O’Hagan added: "Virtual1 has built an award-winning self-service portal and suite of APIs to enable businesses to virtually manage their networks with complete visibility of real-time bandwidth, reducing partners manual intervention and cost, whilst improving the customer experience.
"We’re delighted to be able to expand the reach of our solutions and increase our scale as a network provider with TalkTalk."
Lazard & Co Limited acted as financial advisor to TalkTalk on the transaction.
Arma Partners acted as financial advisor to Virtual1 on the deal, alongside Latham & Watkins as legal advisor.
