OREANDA-NEWS. CityFibre Infrastructure Holdings Plc (AIM: CFHL), a leading designer, builder, owner, and operator of fibre optic infrastructure in UK towns and cities, is pleased to announce the appointment of EY as independent advisor to the Company with regard to its debt funding plans. 

The Company's project pipeline has strengthened over the past twelve months and now covers all four of the strategic pillars identified at the time of the IPO:

·     public sector networks, as exemplified by the York, Peterborough and Kirklees projects;

·     business ISPs, with more than 20 partners and resellers active on the Company's networks today;

·     FTTH, via the Company's Joint Venture with Sky and TalkTalk in York;

·     fibre-to-the-tower (FTTT), where the first phase of the first deployment under a national framework agreement with major mobile network operators, in Kingston-upon-Hull, was completed in late December 2014.

The Company has thus now established a significant national opportunity across all four strategic pillars, which may over time extend CityFibre's footprint to dozens of additional UK towns and cities. Accordingly, the Board has identified debt funding as a priority issue in the ongoing capital formation of the Company, to ensure that shareholder returns are maximized.

Terry Hart, Chief Financial Officer of CityFibre, commented:

"CityFibre's growth prospects expanded considerably in 2014, and the Board is very much committed to putting in place a well-balanced capital structure which allows the Company to scale in line with these expansion opportunities. We evaluated a number of potential advisors and selected EY because of their great track record, cultural fit with our team, and focus on delivery. We're delighted to bring EY into our circle of trusted advisors."   

Chris Lowe, Debt Advisory Partner, and Marc Middleton, TMT Partner at EY, commented:

"We are really pleased and excited to have been appointed as an advisor to CityFibre as it launches a programme to secure debt funding to support its growth. Given the significant progress of the Company during 2014, combined with the optionality of funding sources from the credit markets, we look forward to working with the team there as they raise debt capital in the coming months."