Pedro Blanes: "Companies that do not digitize will have no place in the market"

Pedro Blanes is the director of operations at Fibwi, with him we talked about how he has adapted to the new situation derived from the pandemic and what his future plans are.


**-Let's do a little review of the Fibwi situation. You started out providing internet services and have already diversified to include media.**


-We started in 2009 offering internet services in remote places in Mallorca where the network did not reach or where the connection quality was very poor. We grew a lot by creating a network of repeaters on the island and later. Starting in 2015 we expanded to Ibiza.


We saw that fiber optics would be a technology that would prevail in the market and we decided to start creating projects in towns that were outside the radar of the forecasts of the large operators. We were the first local operator to begin fiber optic deployment.


Since 2014 we have not stopped making investments in towns and we have around 40 towns in service in Mallorca. We plan to do all of Mallora and Ibiza. Regarding Menorca, we are evaluating it but we will surely also cover it. Thus we will become a regional telecommunications operator of reference.




**"We will become a regional telecommunications operator of reference"**



At the same time, in 2017 we started broadcasting the radio channel on FM and after a year we started broadcasting the TV channel on local DTT frequencies. This offer has been developed to be able to offer fiber optic television services. This is an increase in value compared to just providing internet.


We have also diversified our work and make content for other TV channels that are sold on other telecommunications platforms.




**-How have you faced work and the future in the midst of the pandemic?**


-From the beginning, we faced many difficulties due to legal, labor and health insecurity. There were too many changes in criteria and we did not know how we had to provision our investments and activity. Then we dimensioned the way of working, once we obtained the status of essential service and found relative normality. This allowed us to continue with our network deployment plans and offering services with the quality we wanted.




**-What volume of investment are you managing?**


-We have made investments of around 1.5 million annually and we will maintain this pace in the next two years.



**-Has this pandemic brought about many changes in the way we work?**


-Yes, because we have to maintain strict safety measures at work. Following the recommendations makes the work much slower. The health issue always prevails. The fact that you may have a positive test for Covid puts the activity of the entire company at risk. We have to be very demanding in these protocols.



**"The fact that you may have a positive test for Covid endangers the activity of the entire company"**






**-The telecommunications sector is tremendously competitive. What is the key to surviving and growing in the midst of this competition?**


-We approach everything from the point of view of creating value and providing quality in our products. If you have to break into a market with large operators you have to have a quality bet with reasonable prices. You have to be different from the rest. For example, with our fiber signal you can have internet on all the televisions at home, something that no one else can do. We offer an offer of 150 channels that few operators can offer.


This gives us a market niche that we can exploit. We also go to areas not covered by other operators, which gives us significant growth.


We have to be able to make our value proposition seduce and attract new customers. If not, if you go only on price you have no ability to be profitable.



**-How has customer growth been?**


-We have been growing at a rate of 20 or 25% annually but investments have been growing at the same rate. You have to control both things because if not you may find that the numbers do not add up.




**-Financing and liquidity of companies is a fundamental pillar to overcome this crisis. Do you think that the administrations have provided enough facilities?**




-The public administration has done work to ensure liquidity for companies in a future context in which there was no income forecast, which has been short on forecasts. The recovery will not be as short as expected and therefore the grace periods would have to be lengthened for companies to generate income to meet the repayments of these loans. If companies have to start repaying loans without having income, we will enter a negative spiral for the economy.


In our case, from the beginning we had many financing difficulties because the banking sector did not understand our business and they always asked for real estate guarantees. With the development of the sector we have been able to professionalize the way of explaining our project to the banks and they have been more open to understanding what type of business we had.


**-One of the banks you work with is BBVA. How has the relationship with this entity been?**


-We are more than satisfied. With BBVA we have always had very personal attention and this has allowed us to explain our project well. BBVA has perfectly understood our business model. Until we reached them, the other banks did not want to get involved in the risk part or they demanded real estate guarantees that we could not provide. BBVA's support has allowed us to grow as a company.




**"BBVA has perfectly understood our business model"**



We must keep in mind that in the economic operations of ICT companies, the risk and forecast studies that banks normally handle in traditional productive sectors are not useful.




**-How do you see the business prospects in the coming months?**


-Right now we have a serious problem. There is no medium-term definition of the measures that will be adopted by the public administration. This means that everything you consider is always conditioned to what the administrations, which are the ones that set the regulations, can redo.




The fact that we are an essential service, a product with a lot of demand and that with the pandemic its necessity has been revalued means that we can be somewhat optimistic, especially because we see a horizon of hope with vaccination. The better the market goes, the more demand there will be for the Internet and the services we offer and the more capacity we will have to grow.




The pandemic has highlighted and accelerated digitalization as the only way forward for all companies and all workers. Those that do not digitize will have no place in the market. We provide the means to make all this possible. Every year we doubled our flow capacity for our customers and there have been years when it has had to be tripled.