It was then bought by its employees, in 1997 it was purchased by FirstGroup and was part of First Hampshire & Dorset until their Southampton operations ceased in February 2023.

The bus network continued largely unchanged until 1986, when the company was reformed as an arms length operation and renamed Southampton Citybus.

[4] Following the Transport Act 1985 and the deregulation of the bus market, it faced aggressive competition from Southern Vectis, the dominant Isle of Wight bus company, which started Solent Blue Line in 1987 as a bid to expand onto the mainland, competing on some of the same major routes as Citybus.

Following this Citybus introduced sixteen natural gas powered Dennis Dart buses into regular service, the largest such fleet in the UK.

[8] In 2022, after 25 years of operations, First announced they would withdraw their CityRed bus services from Southampton in February 2023.