{"id":640518,"date":"2026-04-15T10:00:07","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T08:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=640518"},"modified":"2026-04-15T10:01:03","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T08:01:03","slug":"the-executive-who-lives-in-croatia-and-still-runs-one-of-south-africas-biggest-isps","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/internet\/640518-the-executive-who-lives-in-croatia-and-still-runs-one-of-south-africas-biggest-isps.html","title":{"rendered":"The executive who lives in Croatia and still runs one of South Africa’s biggest ISPs"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Axxess founder and marketing director Franco Barbalich says there have been upsides and challenges since he moved to Croatia while remaining actively involved in the ISP he founded nearly 30 years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Barbalich attended Milner High School and recalled that his very first job<\/a> was an apprenticeship as an instrument technician, with a gross monthly salary of under R500.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He founded Axxess in his one-bedroom flat in 1997.  At the time, it was called Axxess Africa and only offered website hosting and design.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was the dawn of the Internet in South Africa, and Barbalich soon realised there was a growing market for access services.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Axxess Africa expanded its product offering to include analogue dial-up services and Internet access through four Internet Cafes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It rebranded as Axxess and began offering a range of products and services, including hardware and business connectivity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2008, the company launched over 600 Wi-Fi hotspots across South Africa and won the Internet Service Provider (ISP) of the Year award for the first time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2009, Andrew Simpson left Internet Solutions, where he was General Manager, and joined the company as a director with a mission to disrupt the broadband market further.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Barbalich and Simpson focused on offering the best value-for-money products backed by world-class service levels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A good example of this strategy was launching the most affordable mobile data in South Africa with a three-month data rollover. It was groundbreaking at the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The strategy of affordable services and great support worked. Axxess was named ISP of the Year twice more \u2014 in 2009 and 2015 \u2014 and the business flourished.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2010, former Internet Solutions chief executive Angus MacRobert acquired a minority stake in Axxess, which was already one of the four largest independent ISPs in South Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2011, Afrihost acquired Axxess for a combination of cash and equity. All of Axxess\u2019s shareholders except MacRobert were bought out. He became a new minority shareholder in Afrihost.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All the Axxess staff and management kept their positions, and it has been business as usual at the Port Elizabeth (now Gqeberha)\u2013based Internet service provider.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Barbalich has continued serving as marketing director, while Simpson is CEO, and the company has continued to expand, offering LTE fixed wireless access and mobile data products.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Working from Croatia<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Andrew Simpson and Franco Barbalich<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Barbalich has immigrated to Croatia, but frequently travels to South Africa and spends time at the Axxess offices in the Friendly City.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOne of the biggest advantages for me has been gaining a fresh perspective. Being outside South Africa makes you think differently,\u201d Barbalich told MyBroadband.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou start noticing how other international ISPs operate, where new opportunities are, and what marketing trends are coming through.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He said it also gave him some breathing room to focus on growing the business instead of navigating from one crisis to the next.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat said, an ISP isn\u2019t something you can just leave on autopilot. It\u2019s hands-on, technical, and very customer-driven.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Regarding the challenges he\u2019s faced since emigrating, Barbalich said the biggest one was the distance from his colleagues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou can\u2019t just pop into the office or jump in quickly when something goes wrong. You really must rely on a strong management team on the ground,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAlso, a lot of daily Microsoft Teams chats to stay in the loop. Luckily, I\u2019m in the same time zone, which helps a lot. And have an awesome team of people at Axxess.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Barbalich said he makes a point of regularly visiting the Axxess office for in-person meetings, as well as for anything that benefits from in-person interaction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFor me, it all comes down to having the right people and systems in place. If that\u2019s sorted, running an ISP from abroad is definitely doable, but it\u2019s not something you can treat casually.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Photos of the Axxess offices in Gqeberha<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Axxess founder and managing director Franco Barbalich says there have been upsides and challenges since he moved to Croatia while remaining actively involved in the ISP he founded nearly 30 years ago.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":640519,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,40380],"tags":[1765,4652],"class_list":["post-640518","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-internet","category-trending","tag-axxess","tag-franco-barbalich"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640518"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=640518"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640518\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":640601,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640518\/revisions\/640601"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/640519"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=640518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=640518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=640518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}