View the webinar recording below.
On 6 November 2025, Watson Farley & Williams and SBR-net Consulting AG hosted a joint webinar titled ‘The Future of Municipal Infrastructure – Cooperation, Partnerships and Investments in Fiber Optic Networks’.
Speakers included Christian R. Schindler (Partner, WFW), Rebecca Trampe-Berger (Counsel, WFW), Dr. Ernst-Olav Ruhle (SBR-net Consulting AG) and Dieter Lindauer (Managing Director, Stadtwerke Neustadt am Rübenberge).
The webinar explored how municipal utilities are responding to the growing strategic, economic and regulatory challenges of expanding and operating high-performance fiber-optic networks. With rising investment costs, complex legal frameworks and limited scalability, independent infrastructure development is becoming increasingly difficult.
As a result, cooperation, partnerships and investment models are gaining traction – offering opportunities to share risks, unlock synergies and improve long-term profitability. However, these models also require careful legal structuring, technical integration and economic evaluation.
Key insights from the session include:
- fiber expansion faces economic pressure – cooperation is key to scaling and financing;
- three partnership models dominate: network access agreements, asset deals and joint ventures;
- regulatory hurdles like wayleave rights and funding conditions require strategic planning; and
- technical integration, scalability and net documentation are critical success factors.
The message was clear: collaboration is no longer optional – it’s essential for sustainable infrastructure development.
If you have any questions about the topics discussed, please feel free to contact your usual WFW contact or Christian and Rebecca at any time.
