Fort Collins Internet, data services company FRII to be acquired

FORT COLLINS — After nearly 21 years in business, the founders of Front Range Internet Inc., commonly known as FRII, are working on a deal to sell the company to an undisclosed buyer.

Bill Ward, co-founder and chief executive of the company, confirmed Wednesday that a sale is in the works and could close as soon as the next couple of weeks.

Fort Collins-based FRII, 3350 Eastbrook Drive, provides Internet and commercial data services primarily for businesses in Northern Colorado, though its reach covers most of the state as well as clients on the East Coast.

Ward said he couldn’t disclose many details of the arrangement or changes that may or may not be on tap until the deal is final, but noted that he believes the plan is for the company to keep its own branding. Ward anticipates that the company’s roughly 20 employees would remain following the merger – including himself, at least for some period of time, and son Brad Ward, the company’s chief operations officer.

“We thought maybe it was time,” the 70-year-old Ward said. “I’m happy about this. It wasn’t necessarily in the plan when it first started. But we started talking and thought it might be a good thing to do. I think it’s certainly going to be good for the longer-range plan of the company.”

Ward said the pending sale of the company came about after FRII officials connected with a group associated with a customer FRII was pursuing.

“They ended up looking at what we had and decided they preferred to own it rather than be a customer,” Ward said. “One thing led to another and now we’re finding a way to finish it.”

Ward — a veteran of the aerospace industry and a former F-106 pilot in the Air Force — founded FRII along with his son and Andy Neely in 1995 as an Internet service provider. The Wards are majority owners of the company, while Neely remains a shareholder but no longer works with FRII. Ward said annual revenue has hovered around $4 million for the past few years.

FRII’s mission has evolved over time, though it does still offer ISP services and also serves some residential customers.

The company has three large 10-gigabit fiber optic rings around Loveland, Fort Collins and Estes Park, with expansion into Windsor on the way. The company also offers its WiFRII high-speed wireless Internet service for local small businesses.

In addition to the Internet services, though, FRII’s offerings include data center and cloud services, hosting and email, and professional services.

While most of the company’s business is in Colorado, chief information officer Garry Myall said the firm does have some customers on the East Coast who back up their systems and data with FRII’s data center in Fort Collins to hedge against coastal storms knocking out their primary data centers closer to home.

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