Business model reinvention is a hot topic in the UK’s fibre provider space, and balancing the key components driving change is an immediate priority for all players in the sector, according to industry leaders at last month’s state of the full fibre market insight session hosted by Fibre Provider in association with Xantaro and Nokia.
Mon, 17/06/2024 - 10:38
Telenco is thriving in the UK fibre market as shifting altnet priorities favour suppliers that can prove flexibility and reactivity. Here, MD Clément Lesur explains why Telenco’s unique model positions it to help partners deliver connections with speed and quality.
Telenco UK is actively working with a few dozen operators ranging from Tier One to hyper-local, offering a full package of design, manufacturing, distribution and training services. It is differentiated in the market through its ability to pair manufacturing services with distribution capabilities, according to Clément.
He said: “We can quickly support customers with our available stock whilst at the same time launching the manufacturing of new products for their future installations. This means our partners don’t have to take time-consuming breaks between their projects. Likewise, we can work with them on improvements that will help expedite their rollouts.”
Crucially, the company’s manufacturing sites are in Europe enabling them to optimise the lead time, and its warehouses are in the UK so customers can limit their levels of stock and gain quick access to resources. This is important following a period of high inflation and increased interest rates with investors now demanding that altnets quickly become revenue-generative.
Whereas two years ago altnets were demanding vast quantities of stock from suppliers to ensure they could pass a maximum of homes, connections are now key. Clément noted: “This is creating new challenges for the operators and is shifting the relationships they have with suppliers. Stock is not the issue anymore but more the ability of suppliers to meet their bespoke needs.
“Altnets are looking more at solutions helping them to connect customers faster, and right the first time. Indeed, a lot of altnets have suffered from maintenance costs, where they had to send an engineer at least a second time after the first installation was done, significantly increasing their build cost.
“When connecting customers, you face countless different scenarios in the field, so being able to offer different type of cables with different lengths for example, is something which would be very difficult for a pureplay distributor.
This pivot was easy for Telenco which has a strong specialisation in customer connections. Clément added: “We haven’t seen a decrease in demand for stock, just a shift in focus. This has presented an advantage across a number of products.” These include metal work, fibre drop cables, fibre enclosures (transition boxes), and the tools and consumables needed by engineers during the installation process. Clément noted: “Many altnets are aware of our historical activities around anchoring solutions for overhead deployments, but some of them don’t always realise that we now offer more end-to-end solutions from the exchange to the end customer.”
To ensure that the delivery of these items is done correctly, Telenco operates a training centre, CTTS, to technically supports its customers on installation best practice for all its products. “This has helped us convincing some new customers who weren’t getting the level of support that they needed from their incumbent suppliers,” added Clément.
A further differentiator for Telenco is the ESG benefits it can pass to altnets due to its European manufacturing sites. Due to its raw material being sourced mainly from Europe, near its plants, its relative sustainability is quite advanced compared to other suppliers. Telenco is also investing significantly in Life Cycle Analysis to see the overall impact of the products that it supplies to its customers, and identify ways to optimise the entire processes. Clément added: “All our new products are now designed having this in mind, and existing ones are also optimised based on these requirements.”
As well as continuing to increase its market share in the fixed networks arena, and develop new products and solutions, Telenco UK aims to grow activities across datacenter and mobile networks during 2024. Clément finished: “These are new markets for Telenco in the UK, so we need to build brand awareness, however these offers were already created in the rest of the Group years ago so it’s more a question of allocating the right resources in the UK, for each market.”
