GTT on Monday announced it was buying KPN International, which is a division of Dutch carrier KPN, for $56 million.
Once the deal passes various regulatory approvals, GTT will gain KPN International's fiber assets and points of presence (PoPs) that span 21 European countries including long-haul fiber routes and metro rings in Frankfurt, London, Amsterdam and Paris.
The acquisition will add more than 400 strategic enterprise and carrier clients to GTT's customer portfolio. Once the deal is completed in the third quarter of this year, GTT will be the preferred international network supplier for an additional 400 clients retained by KPN.
“The acquisition of KPN International deepens our market presence in the European region,” said President and CEO Rick Calder, in a prepared statement. “The world-class resources contributed from this acquisition, including a highly experienced team, international network assets and a deep roster of multinational clients, will help us deliver on our purpose of connecting people across organizations around the world and to every application in the cloud.”
In an interview last year with FierceTelecom, Calder said that acquisitions both large and small were still on the table for his company. Mergers and acquisitions have been the lifeblood of GTT. To date, GTT has completed more than 30 mergers and acquisitions.
McLean, Virginia-based GTT announced in February of last year that it was buying Interoute, one of Europe’s largest independent fiber networks and cloud networking platforms, for $2.3 billion in cash.
When the deal was announced, GTT said it expanded its Tier 1 global IP network with a 72,000-km fiber network in Europe as well as over 400 points of presence, spanning 24 metro areas and interconnecting 126 cities across 29 countries.
While the Interoute deal closed in May of 2018, KeyBanc Capital Markets analyst Brandon Nispel downgraded GTT last Tuesday due to integration issues, according to an article by Benzinga.
RELATED: GTT Communications snaps up Access Point for $40M
In October, GTT Communications bought North Carolina-based service provider Access Point by paying $35 million in cash and $5 million in stock.