Yet Hull-based Connexin was still such a small company last year that it was officially exempt from publishing its full financial accounts. And before a sudden boost in its fortunes late in 2017, it had just £757 in the bank, was half a million pounds in debt, and its latest plan for greatness was about to be defeated – again – by the big telecoms companies it had been striving to unseat with its ‘disruptive’ business model.

It has been playing for the big-time since it launched in 2006, after its founders Furqan Alamgir and Alex Yeung wrote software to let people to make free phone calls by turning their voice signals into data and sending it over the internet. What they did was, by their accounts, much like Skype – which eBay bought for $2.6bn in 2005. But while Skype was started by a small bunch of programmers who re-purposed software made for music file-sharing that had already proved a sensation, Connexin’s founding myth has it that Alamgir and Yeung did it on their own from scratch when they were students. They still spent the next decade driving their modest internet telephony business, and made a mark with charitable deeds and caring slogans. By the time Microsoft bought Skype for $8.5bn (£7bn) in 2011, Connexin CEO Alamgir had put up £30,000 himself just to keep the business going.

The terms of Connexin’s latest bid for the big time, which could see the Hull-based firm sell its company on the stock market within four years, were set by its tax-haven investors, who bought almost half its business for £10m last September, just as its last great plan was about to go awry.

Digital Alpha, an investment fund with roots in the secretive US states of Delaware and Nevada, and access to a $400m (£300m) group of investment funds registered in the offshore tax haven of the Cayman Islands, made Connexin agree that it would aspire to a £30m sale in return for their £10m-worth of help and a partnership with US internet technology giant Cisco.

The offshore investors would gain power to sell the company on a major stock exchange – such as Nasdaq or the London Stock Exchange – in September 2022, according to details buried in the agreement they filed at Companies House on 26 September 2017. This initial public offering (IPO) should raise no less than £30m, it said. It would make Alamgir’s share in the business worth £11m.

In return, Connexin traded its ambition to transform the telecoms industry for a plan to transform the public realm, as a part of internet giant Cisco’s Smart City Strategy. Connexin would build wireless internet networks across city centres upon which Cisco and its ecosystem of software suppliers would build digital public services, in collaboration with local public authorities.

Connexin was ushered into its latest gambit with the help of friends in high places, who have been guiding it since long before if acquired wealthy friends in far-flung places.

William Priest, now chief executive of the government Geospatial Commission at the Cabinet Office, and a board member at the government department of Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, took a 10 per cent share in Connexin in 2010, helping reverse its fortunes at a time when it was driving itself into the ground with its plan to unseat the big telecoms companies with an internet telephone service.

Priest, a telecoms industry grandee, and veteran of both Orange and US telco Verizon, helped steer Connexin’s ambitions into wireless networking, and oversaw its last failed gambit: an attempt to compete with the multinational mobile phone companies on their own terms. He joined the Connexin board in 2014 alongside an industry peer, Professor Edwin Candy, who had built 3G mobile networks in nine countries when he worked as technology director for mobile multinational Hutchison 3G in the noughties. With their help, Connexin puffed itself up to bid against the big four mobile telcos for a share of £1.4bn of mobile phone airwaves the UK government sold in its first auction of 5G spectrum in March. But it didn’t see the plan through.

Long before that, Priest oversaw Connexin’s move to Hull, a city in north-east England with a telecoms market made uniquely microcosmic because the role usually played by UK-wide telco BT was taken by local firm Kingston Communications. It pursued its disruptive ambitions there, contending to be the main local broadband provider with its wireless network, for the last ten years.

Since going into business with Cisco and its offshore financiers though, Connexin has made great progress building wireless networks primed to run smart city services in other cities across the north, while Cisco has been attempting to sell its smart–city software systems to local authorities: including Hull, Newcastle and Bradford.

Furqan Alamgir, CEO of Connexin, was not available for comment. His LinkedIn profile became unavailable when E&T sought to approach him for information about his IPO plans. Connexin did not respond. Rick Shrotri, fund manager for Digital Alpha, who took a seat on Connexin’s board after its acquisition of Connexin last September, did not respond to a request for comment.

UK tech companies almost ceased making IPOs in 2017, with accounting firms blaming uncertainty around Brexit for making them cautious. Europe since saw its IPOs drop a fifth overall, according to figures published by accounting firm PwC this week. It blamed general market decline and the US-China trade stand-off.

Marty Lau, a partner at accounting firm Moore Stephens, said in a written statement UK would see few IPOs “till the situation surrounding Brexit becomes certain.”

Yet Hull-based Connexin was still such a small company last year that it was officially exempt from publishing its full financial accounts. And before a sudden boost in its fortunes late in 2017, it had just £757 in the bank, was half a million pounds in debt, and its latest plan for greatness was about to be defeated – again – by the big telecoms companies it had been striving to unseat with its ‘disruptive’ business model.

It has been playing for the big-time since it launched in 2006, after its founders Furqan Alamgir and Alex Yeung wrote software to let people to make free phone calls by turning their voice signals into data and sending it over the internet. What they did was, by their accounts, much like Skype – which eBay bought for $2.6bn in 2005. But while Skype was started by a small bunch of programmers who re-purposed software made for music file-sharing that had already proved a sensation, Connexin’s founding myth has it that Alamgir and Yeung did it on their own from scratch when they were students. They still spent the next decade driving their modest internet telephony business, and made a mark with charitable deeds and caring slogans. By the time Microsoft bought Skype for $8.5bn (£7bn) in 2011, Connexin CEO Alamgir had put up £30,000 himself just to keep the business going.

The terms of Connexin’s latest bid for the big time, which could see the Hull-based firm sell its company on the stock market within four years, were set by its tax-haven investors, who bought almost half its business for £10m last September, just as its last great plan was about to go awry.

Digital Alpha, an investment fund with roots in the secretive US states of Delaware and Nevada, and access to a $400m (£300m) group of investment funds registered in the offshore tax haven of the Cayman Islands, made Connexin agree that it would aspire to a £30m sale in return for their £10m-worth of help and a partnership with US internet technology giant Cisco.

The offshore investors would gain power to sell the company on a major stock exchange – such as Nasdaq or the London Stock Exchange – in September 2022, according to details buried in the agreement they filed at Companies House on 26 September 2017. This initial public offering (IPO) should raise no less than £30m, it said. It would make Alamgir’s share in the business worth £11m.

In return, Connexin traded its ambition to transform the telecoms industry for a plan to transform the public realm, as a part of internet giant Cisco’s Smart City Strategy. Connexin would build wireless internet networks across city centres upon which Cisco and its ecosystem of software suppliers would build digital public services, in collaboration with local public authorities.

Connexin was ushered into its latest gambit with the help of friends in high places, who have been guiding it since long before if acquired wealthy friends in far-flung places.

William Priest, now chief executive of the government Geospatial Commission at the Cabinet Office, and a board member at the government department of Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, took a 10 per cent share in Connexin in 2010, helping reverse its fortunes at a time when it was driving itself into the ground with its plan to unseat the big telecoms companies with an internet telephone service.

Priest, a telecoms industry grandee, and veteran of both Orange and US telco Verizon, helped steer Connexin’s ambitions into wireless networking, and oversaw its last failed gambit: an attempt to compete with the multinational mobile phone companies on their own terms. He joined the Connexin board in 2014 alongside an industry peer, Professor Edwin Candy, who had built 3G mobile networks in nine countries when he worked as technology director for mobile multinational Hutchison 3G in the noughties. With their help, Connexin puffed itself up to bid against the big four mobile telcos for a share of £1.4bn of mobile phone airwaves the UK government sold in its first auction of 5G spectrum in March. But it didn’t see the plan through.

Long before that, Priest oversaw Connexin’s move to Hull, a city in north-east England with a telecoms market made uniquely microcosmic because the role usually played by UK-wide telco BT was taken by local firm Kingston Communications. It pursued its disruptive ambitions there, contending to be the main local broadband provider with its wireless network, for the last ten years.

Since going into business with Cisco and its offshore financiers though, Connexin has made great progress building wireless networks primed to run smart city services in other cities across the north, while Cisco has been attempting to sell its smart–city software systems to local authorities: including Hull, Newcastle and Bradford.

Furqan Alamgir, CEO of Connexin, was not available for comment. His LinkedIn profile became unavailable when E&T sought to approach him for information about his IPO plans. Connexin did not respond. Rick Shrotri, fund manager for Digital Alpha, who took a seat on Connexin’s board after its acquisition of Connexin last September, did not respond to a request for comment.

UK tech companies almost ceased making IPOs in 2017, with accounting firms blaming uncertainty around Brexit for making them cautious. Europe since saw its IPOs drop a fifth overall, according to figures published by accounting firm PwC this week. It blamed general market decline and the US-China trade stand-off.

Marty Lau, a partner at accounting firm Moore Stephens, said in a written statement UK would see few IPOs “till the situation surrounding Brexit becomes certain.”