Stångåstaden kickbacks and hidden rent
Company
Stångåstaden is a municipality owned public housing company based in Linköping, Sweden. They own and manage around 18000 units.[1]
Background
Stångåstaden has ownership of the fiber infrastructure in their real estate, which they rent out to network management service companies, who in turn charge ISPs for access to use the fiber network to provide internet for their customers.[3]
[Incident]
In 2025 Stångåstaden has, through a public procurement, switched the network management service provider. The winner for of the public procurement was the company Telia (under the brand "Zitius"). The reason behind Stångåstaden choosing Zitius was because Zitius was willing to pay the highest amount of net rent (kickbacks) to Stångåstaden. In the public procurement offer the factor of net rent amount, far outweighed any other factors such as quality of service. The amount paid as the net rent (kickbacks) was not disclosed, but was estimated to 100-150SEK per unit per month which totals up to somewhere between 16.8 and 25.2 millions SEK per year. As a result the monthly fee charged to the ISPs increased by 160SEK per month, which in turn was passed down to their customers, making it a hidden rent cost that would be blamed on the ISPs rather than on Stångåstaden, and that would also bypass any regulations regarding rent costs of public housing. [3]
When the ISP company Bahnhof increased the cost of fiber internet for their customers they were transparent, and explained in an e-mail to affected customers, the reason for the increased monthly cost, mentioning the the new deal Stångåstaden has made with Zitius. [3]
Stångåstaden has reacted by threatening Bahnhoff with legal actions, unless Bahnhoff would send out a correction letter composed by Stångåstaden, which Bahnhof refused to do. [3]
Stångåstaden's response
When Fredrik Törnqvist, CEO at Stångåstaden was interviewed by Corren (corren.se), he claimed that the reason for the legal threats was that the mail from Bahnhof to their customers made it seem like Stångåstaden was doing something illegal. After some pressure, Fredrik consented that the fees could be seen as a form of a hidden rent, since this net rent is a big deal of the companies economy and thanks to it they did not need to increase the advertised rent. He then fell back on the claim that Stångåstaden did nothing illegal. [4]
Fallout
This incident highlighted a problem that despite internet being almost a necessity nowadays and not a luxury, the providers are not regulated the same way as providers of other necessities (such as electricity or water) are. The rise in prise of the internet in public housings compared to privately owned real estate indicates that Stångåstaden is not the only company who practices similar fee schemes. The incident has started a movement (led by Bahnhof) that attempts to convince politicians to make further regulations that will take the connection to the internet into account [5]
References