Zetnet

Zetnet Limited

Type	Limited
Founded	(1994)
Headquarters	Shetland Isles, Manchester
Industry	Internet
Products	Internet Services
Website	http://www.zetnet.com

Zetnet is one of the UK's oldest ISPs and according to a New Scientist article^[1] is the brainchild of Ghufar Razaq and Graeme Story. It was founded in Lerwick, on the remote Shetland Isles by Ghufar Razaq, Graeme Storey, Tim Cole and Paul Martin. According to the Shetland Fishing News, a journal of Shetland's Fishing Industries, the company began trading on 13 October 1994.^[2][3]

History

In October 1994, Zetnet began trading as Zetnet Services Limited.

In 1996, Zetnet was thrown into the media spotlight through what nearly became a landmark legal case testing UK copyright laws on the internet.

In March 1999 Zetnet founded online gaming service Netgames UK, the brainchild of Sandy Sandom and Phil O'Malley.^[4] It was originally a wholly owned subsidiary, sharing Zetnet technical staff, but was sold in May 2000 and incorporated as Netgames UK Ltd.^[5] The company was run successfully until August 2001 when reports of a press release detailing a fall-out between Netgames UK management and its technical staff were seen.^[6]

In 1999, Zetnet hosted the CVS tree for the eggdrop project, an IRC bot. The CVS was maintained by staff member Jonathan Miles (Cybah), who also coordinated and committed patch contributions for the Eggdrop Development Team.^[7]

In 2001, Zetnet took over Charis Internet Services, a Birmingham-based ISP.

In January 2002 Zetnet bought the customers of troubled ISP Cloud-Nine Communications, which had suffered a DDoS attack.^[8][9] Cloud Nine were based in Basingstoke, run by CEO Emeric Miszti and Operations Director John Parr.^[10]

On May 12th 2003, Zetnet co-founder and Technical Director, Tim Cole, died. The Zetnet home page was changed during the following week, to say "with great sadness Zetnet announces the death of Tim Cole co-founder director" and also "Tim had been suffering with heart problems for many years. On Sunday evening he had a heart attack from which he did not recover". According to an unconfirmed source, Tim's headstone says simply "internet pioneer" and can be found in the yard of the Dunrossness Kirk, Dunrossness in the south of Shetland.^[11]

In February 2005, Zetnet closed its head office in the Shetland Isles.^[12][13] According to the Shetland News, much of Zetnet's operations were run from an office in Manchester at the time.

In May 2007, a press release surfaced on PRWeb which indicated that Zetnet was to be purchased by Solutrea Ltd, a "wireless and digital signage solutions provider".^[14][15] John Hyslop was quoted as Zetnet's Managing Director at the time. The deal was reported to have been worth "£857,000 in cash upon closing". However, the agreement was "subject to approval by the Powerstar International Inc. (TSX.V : PWS), board of directors and the Toronto Ventures Exchange". No further information could be found to confirm that this deal was ever completed.

In July 2008, Zetnet was acquired by Breathe Networks Limited (BNL), according to a news article by ISPreview.co.uk.^[16] Zetnet joined other BNL brands such as breathe, macunlimited, Ecosse, Intensive Networks, Bush Internet and Fast4. BNL stated an intent to operate Zetnet independently.

From its community based Shetland roots, the company attracted a large clientele across the UK, attracted by its community ethos and open management. Whilst not leaving its Lerwick roots, the main servers are now located in the Manchester DataCentre where most of the company's operations are now carried out.

Legal case

In 1996, Zetnet was caught in the middle of a legal case between two of its local customers, The Shetland Times and The Shetland News, over copyright infringement.^[17] The web sites of both customers were hosted by Zetnet.

References

External links

• Zetnet Ltd

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