The Cloud is a provider of public access

Wi-Fi Wi-Fi () is a family of wireless network protocols, based on the IEEE 802.11 family of standards, which are commonly used for local area networking of devices and Internet access, allowing nearby digital devices to exchange data by radio wave ...

hotspots in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

and is a member of the

Wireless Broadband Alliance Founded in 2003, the Wireless Broadband Alliance (WBA) undertakes programs and activities to address business and technical issues, as well as opportunities, for member companies. WBA work areas include standards development, industry guidelines, ...

. It has over 22,000 Wi-Fi hotspots

network access point Internet exchange points (IXes or IXPs) are common grounds of IP networking, allowing participant Internet service providers (ISPs) to exchange data destined for their respective networks. IXPs are generally located at places with preexisting ...

s in the UK. The Cloud has offices in

St Albans St Albans () is a cathedral city in Hertfordshire, England, east of Hemel Hempstead and west of Hatfield, Hertfordshire, Hatfield, north-west of London, south-west of Welwyn Garden City and south-east of Luton. St Albans was the first major ...

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the States of Germany, German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the List of cities in Germany by popu ...

, and

Stockholm Stockholm () is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, largest city of Sweden as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in Scandinavia. Approximately 980,000 people liv ...

. The company is owned by the

Comcast Comcast Corporation (formerly known as American Cable Systems and Comcast Holdings),Before the AT&T merger in 2001, the parent company was Comcast Holdings Corporation. Comcast Holdings Corporation now refers to a subsidiary of Comcast Corpora ...

group through its subsidiary

Sky Group Sky Group Limited is a British media conglomerate, media and telecommunications conglomerate, which is a division of Comcast, and headquartered in London. It has operations in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Ital ...

History

The Cloud was founded in January 2003, and began roll-out in March of that year. BT Openzone was the first service provider on the network. The Cloud launched its integrated

WLAN A wireless LAN (WLAN) is a wireless computer network that links two or more devices using wireless communication to form a local area network (LAN) within a limited area such as a home, school, computer laboratory, campus, or office buildin ...

and 3G service in 2004. It became available in Germany and the Nordic nations in 2005. Later that year, it acquired Exilan. The Cloud Networks was selected as one of the

World Economic Forum The World Economic Forum (WEF) is an international non-governmental and lobbying organisation based in Cologny, canton of Geneva, Switzerland. It was founded on 24 January 1971 by German engineer and economist Klaus Schwab. The foundation, ...

's New Class of Technology Pioneers for 2006.

Telenor Telenor ASA ( or ) is a Norwegian majority state-owned multinational telecommunications company headquartered at Fornebu in Bærum, close to Oslo. It is one of the world's largest mobile telecommunications companies with operations worldwide, ...

partnered with the Cloud Nordic in 2006 to offer free wifi at public hotspots. Steve Nicholson became CEO of the company in 2007. Between 2005 and 2008, The Cloud acquired German wifi providers GANAG, Airnyx and CANOVA Wireless. In 2008, the company received €15 million in funding from Ferd Ventures, existing investors and GP Bullhound. In 2011, it was acquired by

BSkyB Sky UK Limited is a British broadcaster and telecommunications company that provides television and broadband Internet services, fixed line and mobile telephone services to consumers and businesses in the United Kingdom. It is a subsidiary of ...

Beginning in 2012, Sky began offering free wireless internet to Sky Broadband customers in the UK via The Cloud The Cloud became the exclusive free hotspot provider for

Telefónica Germany Telefónica Germany GmbH & Co. OHG (; also called Telefónica Deutschland ) is a provider of broadband, landline and mobile telecommunications in Germany. The company trades as O2 (typeset as O2). The company was renamed from Telefónica O ...

later that year.o2 starts offering The Cloud Wi-Fi to business customers
retrieved on September 12, 2011 In 2012,

Telefónica Telefónica, S.A. () is a Spanish multinational telecommunications company headquartered in Madrid, Spain. It is one of the largest telephone operators and mobile network providers in the world. It provides fixed and mobile telephony, broadba ...

O2 UK discontinues free access to The Cloud for customers on unlimited Wi-Fi contracts.

CEOs

* 20032007: George Polk * 20072011: Steve Nicholson * 20112014: Vince Russell

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Cloud (company), The Internet service providers of the United Kingdom Wi-Fi providers Sky Group