Spanish Wi-Fi provider Gowex has been forced to declare bankruptcy after shocking revelations that the company had been falsifying its accounts for the past four years.

And, in a written statement, Gowex’s employees have noted a collective “state of complete shock” following the news.

Following the announcement to his board, Gowex CEO Jenaro Garcia Martin tendered his resignation, which was accepted.

According to a statement published by Gowex to Euronext, Martin “declared in the presence of different board members that the financial accounts of the company for the last four years, at least, do not show a full and fair view of the company’s situation, taking responsibility for this falsity.”

The statement continued: “The board, anticipating that the company might not be in a position to face its ongoing debts when they become due, has agreed to file for a declaration of voluntary insolvency, without prejudice of other measure that it may adopt for the best protection of the company’s interests, regarding which it will immediately inform the market as soon as it might adopt them.”

Analyst house Gotham City Research had noted that over 90% of Gowex’s reported revenues did not exist, and summarised that “Gowex’s largest customer was really itself.”

Gowex had described the report as “defamatory” before Martin’s public confession. Martin wrote on Twitter: “I made the deposition and confession. I want to collaborate with the justice. I face the consequences.”

In a scathing update, Gotham City thanked the Spanish people and the media, as well as some grudging respect for Martin following his confession.

“We specialise in exposing fraud, and we acknowledge that Jenaro Garcia Martin’s confession is very rare,” the research firm wrote in a statement. “His confession is quite courageous and honourable, granted only time will truly tell.

“We only hope yesterday’s confession will mark the beginning of a life filled with honesty, redemption, and restitution for Jenaro Garcia Martin,” it added.

Gowex workers, on the other hand, vowed to carry on supporting the firm’s customers for the time being.

“We have ongoing projects with grants for several years, so we are concerned about the customers affected and the damage to our image as professionals, and, also, being linked with some conducts where we just are one more affected part and which we categorically reject,” the statement read.

The statement continued: “Workers still continue in our work posts, to keep providing service and to bring the company forward, despite the circumstances.

“We disassociate ourselves radical[ly] and totally of these facts, and we are considering in taking legal actions as affected part and victims of this situation, which is still being assimilated.

“We expect support and prompt action by the authorities, who we trust, due to our helpless situation,” the statement concludes, with the final paragraph underlined.

Plenty of companies don’t make it, for a variety of reasons, but some can come back. LTE provider LightSquared filed for bankruptcy back in 2012 after its plans to deliver high-speed wireless were blocked by regulators for fear its network would interfere with GPS, as TelecomsTech reported.

Two years on, the company recently unveiled a restructuring plan which involves ceding nearly three quarters of its equity to a new investor group.

For Gowex, and the dethroned CEO Martin, only time – and in the latter’s case, the law – will tell.