Boingo buying student, multi-family Wi-Fi provider Elauwit Networks
On Aug. 1 Boingo Wireless, in addition to announcing a 21.6% year-over-year growth in Q2 2018 revenue to $59.6 million, made public its planned $28 million acquisition of Charleston, S.C.-based Elauwit Networks, a Wi-Fi provider focused on serving student housing and multi-family properties.
Boingo provides Wi-Fi and television services to military facilities throughout the U.S. and in South Korea and Japan. In Q2 the company reported military revenue of $16.7 million, up 23% from the same quarter last year. The Eluawit acquisition “is highly complementary” to the military offering “both in terms of technology, infrastructure and the demographic served,” the company said, and the acquisition expand its addressable market by 16 million multiple-dwelling units.
“The acquisition aligns well with our strategy of securing long-term wireless rights at venues, building state of the art networks at these venues and monetizing those networks through our unique suite of products and services,” Boingo Wireless CEO David Hagan said in a statement. In terms of moving into providing services for MDUs, Hagan said, “We believe there is an opportunity to fuel growth in the…space by putting our capital to work on a selective basis. We also believe there is an opportunity to overlay additional products, such as small cell solutions, for accretive monetization and greater densification of coverage.”
In Q2, Boingo reported revenue of $59.6 million, up 21.6% from Q2 2017 based on growth in it’s Wi-Fi, military and DAS businesses. Wi-FI was the big driver with an 85.3% year-over-year increase to $13.5 million. DAS brought in $21.9 million, up 18% from the same quarter last year.
Also on the Wi-Fi front, Boingo recently said it will bring Wi-Fi service to more than 50 airports in Brazil through an agreement with management company Infraero. That project is expected to wrap up in 2020.
