Contributed Article
by Dave Ferry, Chief Sales Officer at ITS
Scaling full fibre across the UK is not just an engineering challenge. It’s a market challenge, an ecosystem challenge, and above all a collaboration challenge. The question is not whether the UK needs better digital infrastructure – the answer is clear. The real question is how the industry works together to deliver it at scale and speed.
The power of the channel
The technology channel has long been the hidden engine of industry growth. According to Canalys and research undertaken in 2023, more than 70% of global IT spend was delivered through partners, not direct sales. That’s over £2.7 trillion in technologies and services, with the channel outpacing vendors’ direct business. This dynamic isn’t going away. In fact, the analyst house forecasts that the partner ecosystem will almost double in the next decade, with “hundreds of thousands of vendors and millions of partners” shaping the global technology market.
The UK fibre market sits squarely in this picture. From small businesses sourcing connectivity through trusted local resellers and carriers extending reach through wholesale arrangements, to public sector organisations relying on integrators to deliver complex programmes, the channel is critical to scaling fibre adoption. The reality is simple: no single provider can reach every customer segment directly, and no single provider has all the capabilities required.
Complexity demands collaboration
This is especially true in the UK’s SME market. Research from GlobalData shows that service providers often oversimplify segmentation, focusing on employee count alone. But with almost six million SMEs in the UK, ranging from micro-businesses to fast-scaling firms, the reality is far more complex. Many of these businesses source services through third-party resellers rather than direct from the “big four” telcos. For others, consumer-grade products still fill the gap.
What this tells us is that scaling fibre to the UK’s diverse business base requires a smarter go-to-market approach – one that blends direct and indirect strategies and makes the most of specialist partners who can reach the “long tail” of businesses. Collaboration is the only way to cover the full spectrum of demand.
Talking to every part of the channel
For fibre providers, this means thinking differently about partnership. Resellers and ISPs bring reach, trust, and local relationships. Carriers and infrastructure players bring scale, backhaul, and resilience. The public sector brings place-making priorities, from regeneration to digital inclusion. Each group speaks a different language, has different goals, and serves different customers. The art of collaboration lies in being able to engage with each on its own terms – and then connect the dots so that everyone benefits.
This is where trust, flexibility, and shared outcomes become vital. Trust ensures partners can rely on each other’s commitments. Flexibility recognises that a reseller’s needs will differ from a carrier’s or that of a local authority. And shared outcomes keep everyone moving in the same direction – delivering more fibre, to more people, more quickly.
Accelerating the UK’s fibre future
The UK has ambitious goals for nationwide fibre coverage, but the path ahead is uneven. Reaching underserved areas, avoiding overbuild, and ensuring that small businesses aren’t left behind will take more than infrastructure investment. It will take joined-up thinking across the channel, where resellers, carriers, public sector organisations, and vendors work together as part of a bigger picture.
For partners, the opportunity is significant. With fibre as the foundation, they can layer services in cloud, cybersecurity, collaboration, and managed IT – all areas forecast to grow strongly. Research by Canalys further forecasted that cybersecurity alone is expected to grow by more than 11% to reach £63 billion. Meanwhile network infrastructure is set to hit record highs at £58 billion, while cloud application software is predicted to grow by nearly 20% to £172 billion. Overall, IT services spending is expected to exceed £1.2 trillion, with managed services alone worth £400 billion.
For customers, the outcome is better digital performance, stronger security, and more sustainable business growth. And for the UK economy, it’s the digital infrastructure needed to remain competitive in a world defined by data.
Built on collaboration
The future of fibre is not about a single network, a single vendor, or a single channel. It is about ecosystems – interconnected, collaborative, and partner-first. As the market evolves, those who can build and sustain these collaborative models will be the ones who scale fastest and deliver the most impact.
Collaboration isn’t just a nice-to-have in the fibre market. It’s the key to unlocking the scale and reach that the UK’s digital future demands.
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