[Article] Eircom will take 3G mobile licence

Ruu_Old

Sorry if posted already, from rte.ie/business.

Eircom is to take up a third generation mobile licence offered to it by regulator ComReg following the regulator's decision to take the licence back from Smart Telecom.

In third quarter figures this morning to the end of December, Eircom says it now has 819,000 Meteor mobile subscribers with almost 70,000 signing up in the three months up to and covering the Christmas period.

The company also says there are 360,000 broadband customers using Eircom's network, with 60,000 joining in the latest quarter.

Revenue for the quarter was €490m, up 9% on the same period a year earlier, while underlying earnings rose by 8% to €154m. Meteor recorded earnings of €14m.

chrislad

About time. It should have been given to eircom from the start. Smart Telecom were a joke.

The_Hustler

Seeing as they still exist and are offering even better deals than before, I can only assume the "were" means they are not a joke anymore.

spurious

Smart are head and shoulders above Eircom in the broadband market - it's why Eircom were so afraid of them they had to try (and fail) to put them out of business.

The real joke are the people who could move, but choose to pay Eircom double what I pay to Smart for a product that is three times the speed Eircom could manage.

1huge1

true it says so much about the irish people
the kind of people that would join eircom because they wouldn't feel safe joining another
or like the people who stay with vodafone

chrislad

1huge1 wrote:

true it says so much about the irish people
the kind of people that would join eircom because they wouldn't feel safe joining another
or like the people who stay with vodafone

Tell that to the people who got cut off from Smart recently.

Urban Weigl

chrislad wrote:

Tell that to the people who got cut off from Smart recently.

Perhaps it's a self fulfilling prophesy. That being said, it was Eircom's fault for dragging their feet to the extent where it was impossible for Smart to unbundle lines in a timely fashion.

It literally took months, so most potential customers just gave up and went with Eircom. Nasty business, that.

The_Hustler

chrislad wrote:

Tell that to the people who got cut off from Smart recently.

I'm one of them, and I've given my opinion already. I'm not going to give up on such a great deal, and I was one of the worst affected: cut off for 3 months.

Sam Vimes

chrislad wrote:

Tell that to the people who got cut off from Smart recently.

and who cut them off? eircom. and why did they cut them off? because they're afraid of smart

telecomsman

No surprise really that Eircom took up the offer of the licence....with recent developments on 3G Band specifications it may mean Meteor could well roll out a 3G network without spending huge amounts on a UMTS network.


Smart Telecoms PSTN service was cut-off due to bills outstanding. Nothing more sinister than that.

Currently Eircoms broadband service is far behind the offerings of their competitors in this market but in the next 18 months Eircoms investment in Fibre To The Curb and NGN will see a huge improvement in capacity and average speeds.

Sam Vimes

telecomsman wrote:

Smart Telecoms PSTN service was cut-off due to bills outstanding. Nothing more sinister than that.

and the bills were outstanding because they couldn't get enough customers because eircom tried as hard as they could to prevent LLU

Blackdragon

chrislad wrote:

Tell that to the people who got cut off from Smart recently.

Im another one of these people who were cut off and i still dont understand where you coming from. Can you further explain why they are "a joke" without further mention of the disconnection issue due to Eircom.

If you take the time to shop around you will not find a better deal out there.
4mb as standard - No download limits impossed - Top class customer service - I fail to see how the company can be described as "a joke".

rogue-entity

As good as Smart Telecom are, they dont work for everyone. The requirement to change the number just doesnt work for us, we have had our number since eircom was P&T. Too many people know the old one to make it easy to change, especially people in the US and other countries. If that wasnt the issue, it would be price. I want to pay less for my broadband, not more money for a higher speed. Now, if I could get a 4Meg line from smart, for €30/mo, it would be worth considering, but not at their current prices. NTL can do 6Meg broadband for the same price as Smart's 4.

Urban Weigl

The requirement to change your number is Eircoms fault, not Smarts. Yet another example of Eircom ****ing the Irish customer over, and it looks like they are succeeding.

It's worth remembering that you get 4 Mb uncontended with Smart, not to mention line rental is included with the price, whereas the 6 Mb from NTL is contended, and as a result will slow down during the evenings, depending on where you live.

rogue-entity

Oh, I know its eircoms fault, believe me, you are preaching to the choir here. But, you cant blame eircom by itself, they are just a business, and they are doing the same thing smart would do if their positions were reversed. Who you need to blame is good 'ol Dial-Up Dempsey, and his predecessor who sold eircon in the first place. His department has failed to provide ComReg with the powers it needs to tackle the eircom problem. Eircom should be either split up. We should look at the UK as an example of how to do things properly.

And although its 4Meg uncontended, right now, I get a full proper 2Meg connection from BT. My download speed is usually around 230KBytes/sec on good days it can get as high as 250, on bad days it drops as low as 210. So I dont think I am doing so badly for now. And until we have the opportunity to switch to smart without having to change our number, and still have the broadband in a seperate billing account from the telephone service and line rental, it will be a no-go for me since I dont own the phone line, and the parents have no intention of paying for the broadband since I use it the most.

Skyuser

Could Eircom offer 3G wireless Broadband if they get this? For those people who live in the wild...

Urban Weigl

Skyuser wrote:

Could Eircom offer 3G wireless Broadband if they get this? For those people who live in the wild...

Considering Eircom are already squatting on Ireland's only national 3.5GHz license, I wouldn't hold my breath.