• BT’s new strategy is to focus on the UK market
• It is seeking to offload, or attract joint investors for, its international assets
• BT has agreed to sell Radianz, which provides secure networking services to the global financial sector, to US-based Transaction Network Services (TNS)

In line with the UK-focused strategy outlined last year by CEO Allison Kirkby, BT is selling Radianz, its specialist unit that provides secure networking services to the global financial community, to Reston, Virginia-based Transaction Network Services (TNS), a trading infrastructure, connectivity and payments processing company, as part of its ongoing effort to offload its international operations. 

BT declined to share financial details or customer numbers but noted in its announcement about the deal that Radianz – which it describes as the “largest financial information eXchange (FIX) network in the world”, connecting customers in more than 50 countries – generated revenues of £142m in the financial year that ended in March 2025. The Financial Times previously reported that the business generates annual earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) of between £60m and £70m. The deal is expected to close during the first half of 2026.

BT acquired Radianz from financial news agency Reuters in 2005 for $175m as part of a broader services deal.  

“Today’s announcement is another key milestone in focusing our international business on what it does best: Providing secure multi-cloud connectivity to large organisations globally,” stated Bas Burger, who was appointed CEO of BT International earlier this year as part of a top table revamp. 

Radianz managing director Phil Swindle added: “We are proud to have grown and transformed Radianz over the past years while delivering mission critical services to the financial markets community. I am confident that through this planned transaction the complementary strengths of both Radianz and TNS will unlock new opportunities, drive innovation and create sustainable growth for our existing and new customers.”  

The sale of Radianz adds to the growing list of international asset divestments made by BT since Kirkby essentially called time on the UK telco’s international operations in May 2024. The CEO believes the telco’s international operations are a distraction and a drag on margins: Burger’s job will be to “devote all of his time to the optimisation of BT’s international operations and explore options for the unit,” BT noted last year.

Since then it has offloaded its wholesale and enterprise business unit in Ireland to Speed Fibre Group for €22m and has struck a deal to sell its datacentre business in Ireland to Equinix for €59m. 

It has also agreed to sell its operations in Italy to Retelit, a provider of communications and IT services to the Italian enterprise sector, for an undisclosed sum.  BT, which earlier this year reportedly held discussions about international partnerships with the likes of AT&T and Orange, is also creating a standalone business unit for its international operations, a move that will more easily explore its options, which are: To continue running the international business as a fully owned unit but as a much slimmed down operation that isn’t loss-making; find a buyer for the business; or find an external partner/investor that can add scale to BT’s international operations. One of the latter two options would appear to be Kirby’s preference. 

While BT’s international business has been struggling in recent years, that has in part been due to the legacy nature of its infrastructure and services. Now, though, the new standalone unit has BT’s recently developed and launched Global Fabric platform in its arsenal and that should help to make the unit more relevant to customers’ needs, more efficient to run and more attractive to potential partners and/or investors.

- Ray Le Maistre, Editorial Director, TelecomTV