Herotel quietly became South Africa's third-biggest fibre network

Jan

Jan

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South Africa's secret fibre giant

Small town-focused Herotel has quietly grown into South Africa's third-biggest fibre network operator (FNO).

The company recently told MyBroadband the number of homes it had passed with fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) connectivity reached 562,000 by the end of September 2023.
 
Go Herotel go, keep expanding. Would give what to have you Dig this place instead of the useless greedy bunch over at Frotfoot
 
Tweebuffelsmeteenskootmorsdoodgeskietfontein is a farm in the North West province of South Africa that is noted for its unusually long place name of 44 characters—the longest in South Africa and possibly fourth-longest in the world. Located in the Ditsobotla Local Municipality of the Ngaka Modiri Molema District Municipality, some 20 kilometres (12 mi) east of the town of Lichtenburg and 200 kilometres (120 mi) west of Pretoria, the name in Afrikaans means "the spring where two buffaloes were shot stone-dead with one shot" (Afrikaans: Twee buffels met een skoot morsdood geskiet fontein). Originally granted to A.P. de Nysschen on 24 April 1866 by the government of the South African Republic, Tweebuffelsmeteenskootmorsdoodgeskietfontein is also sometimes known by the shortenings Twee buffels (Two buffaloes) and Twee Buffels Geskiet (Two buffaloes shot).
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Tweebuffelsmeteenskootmorsdoodgeskietfontein - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org
 
shame private companies have to own/operate and maintain Fibre networks in SA,
sure it would be easier for every little dorpie and stoepie to have fibre from a SOE and private companies just activate and sell you the equipment to use it.

I mean how else does it work elsewhere in the world? nobody lays fibre at the frantic pace as is local.
 
Jet-Fighter7700 said:
shame private companies have to own/operate and maintain Fibre networks in SA,
sure it would be easier for every little dorpie and stoepie to have fibre from a SOE and private companies just activate and sell you the equipment to use it.

I mean how else does it work elsewhere in the world? nobody lays fibre at the frantic pace as is local.
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Like the Telkom we all hated back then?
 
Jet-Fighter7700 said:
shame private companies have to own/operate and maintain Fibre networks in SA,
sure it would be easier for every little dorpie and stoepie to have fibre from a SOE and private companies just activate and sell you the equipment to use it.

I mean how else does it work elsewhere in the world? nobody lays fibre at the frantic pace as is local.
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In the states it's mostly the same company operating the ISP and the infrastructure. Same for adsl. It was only Telkom's backwards ways that resulted in the unique situation of having both a network operator and ISP. They simply call them ISPs and then don't care how the network works separately from the backhaul as the buck is supposed to stop with the ISP.
 
ld13 said:
Go Herotel go, keep expanding. Would give what to have you Dig this place instead of the useless greedy bunch over at Frotfoot
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Well, they don't really dig that much. Not in my town, anyway. I'm not sure what the correct term is, but they have above ground cables running on poles.
However, service is good and the few outages I've had was usually resolved within a few hours and prices are really competitive @R549 for a 50mbps line. I will happily recommend them.
 
Been with them since 2020. Only once had an issue. One where copper thieves thought they hit the jackpot (smh), Herotel fixed the fiber straight through the night.
Not a real secret, actually.
 
From my point of view, I won't support a closed network FNO. Then we are just allowing the same thing that Telkom did back in the day and saying it's okay.
 
Diabolix said:
From my point of view, I won't support a closed network FNO. Then we are just allowing the same thing that Telkom did back in the day and saying it's okay.
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Closed network FTW then. It is the open-ness of frotfoot that destroys the lure of getting away from Telkom, as they use that to shift the blame to the ISP, than in turn shift the blame to frotfoot, that in turn... :mad:

Telkom has better offerings now at most of the endpoints that I service, with better and more suitable pricing to boot. None of this "you will get 60mbps at this increased price and be happy" nonsense.
 
Herotel is backed by Vumatel.
This is Vuma's attempt to take SA back +10 years and create another closed access Telkom, very clever to go under the radar using the Herotel brand.
 
Koos9999 said:
Herotel is backed by Vumatel.
This is Vuma's attempt to take SA back +10 years and create another closed access Telkom, very clever to go under the radar using the Herotel brand.
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CEO Van Zyl Botha ? I thought Van Zyl and Both were surnames ?

www.herotel.com

Fast fibre rollout makes Herotel a small-town hero - Herotel

Herotel, one of the country's early internet provider startups, has been gobbling up smaller providers to make its mark in non-metro areas, and its CEO Van Zyl Botha says consolidation is key for survival.
www.herotel.com www.herotel.com
 
ld13 said:
Closed network FTW then. It is the open-ness of frotfoot that destroys the lure of getting away from Telkom, as they use that to shift the blame to the ISP, than in turn shift the blame to frotfoot, that in turn... :mad:

Telkom has better offerings now at most of the endpoints that I service, with better and more suitable pricing to boot. None of this "you will get 60mbps at this increased price and be happy" nonsense.
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Telkom's issue back then wasn't really being closed, it was that they wanted a monopoly on teh service they gave, it was them stopping others from operating and blocking other services like Skype. Herotel isn't preventing anyone else from setting up shop and rolling out their own network, as far as I know.
 
Koos9999 said:
Herotel is backed by Vumatel.
This is Vuma's attempt to take SA back +10 years and create another closed access Telkom, very clever to go under the radar using the Herotel brand.
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Vumatel (or maybe it's octotel, don't recall) owns a stake in Herotel, but that is a recent development. They were operating on the same principles before the stock changed hands.
 
That's very good coverage from an ISP/FNO that a lot of people don't know about. Just wish they would also bring upon higher speeds. The competition is not far behind and gives a lot more flexibility on speed selection as them. Come on Herotel
 
KleinBoontjie said:
Telkom's issue back then wasn't really being closed, it was that they wanted a monopoly on teh service they gave, it was them stopping others from operating and blocking other services like Skype. Herotel isn't preventing anyone else from setting up shop and rolling out their own network, as far as I know.
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There is a reason why the FNO's, raced to claim all the high density high median income suburbs... When the cost of trenching and build out a medium size suburb is +R10 million. It does not make sense for a second FNO to enter an already claimed suburb. Most of the customers in the area that are willing to sign up for fibre, will already have signed up to the first FNO... And considering how stable fibre is in general, customers will be unlikely to take the time and effort to switch unless the FNO's start underpricing each other... A losing option as both of them as they would have financed their builds with borrowed money.

Additionally getting Way permits for a 2nd install is going to be a harder sell to the permitting council than the first applicant.
 
Bliksis said:
I agree but what options do you have?
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Register interest with another FNO, but yes, they might not push to get it done as the area is already fibered up. Only way is to probably contact them (Herotel) and query that you want to use ISP XYZ on their network. If they bounce back, you just say that you will then rather go for Fixed-LTE or something.

From an ISP perspective, I can tell you there are a handful of FNO's out there with not-so-great attitudes. From a business level we just install wireless, microwave or trench DFA even though the FNO might already have fibre running down the same stretch of road. In the end they are the ones that loose out.
 
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