Telecom Lead Europe: Fon, a WiFi network with over five
million hotspots, has inked a new partnership with SFR, a telco in France.
The renewed partnership enables all SFR neufbox customers
to enjoy Fon’s over five million hotspots worldwide, as well as SFR’s own four
million hotspots in France.
Fon said SFR is the only one to provide international
WiFi access to its ADSL subscribers. SFR will be further developing SFR WiFi
Fon coverage in France by allowing its neufbox subscribers to join the Fon
network.
SFR is pleased to expand its WiFi community with a
partner like Fon, which has a large international presence. This confirms our commitment
to continuously improve our services. We were the first telco in France to
launch a WiFi community back in 2007. Now, we are delighted to offer all our
neufbox customers access to the largest WiFi network in the world,” said
Pierre-Alain Allemand, Network CEO, SFR.
The partnership will ensure SFR to benefit from a network
of Fon hotspots, which are created both by Fon’s European and global partners.
Users will also benefit from a large network of people who share a small
portion of their unused bandwidth in exchange for free WiFi at Fon Spots
worldwide.
Our priority is to ensure the Fon network has the widest
possible coverage, which is done mainly through partnerships with some of the
world’s largest telcos. The continuation and growth of our partnership with SFR
will ensure our customers have access to an ever increasing number of hotspots
in France, adding to our large and global network of more than five million
hotspots,” said Alex Puregger, COO, Fon.
In Europe, Fon partners with SFR, BT (UK), Belgacom
(Belgium), Netia (Poland) and ZON (Portugal). At a global level, Fon partners
with SoftBank (Japan), Oi (Brazil) and MTC (Russia).
Fon is a fast-growing network, with 1,000 new hotspots
added every four hours.
SFR is the second biggest telecommunications operator in
France, with a turnover of more than EUR12 billion in 2011. In 2011, SFR had 21
million mobile customers, including more than 16 million subscribers and 5
million high-speed home Internet subscribers.
