BT Ireland and Vodafone announce partnership

cyburger

http://www.rte.ie/business/2009/0722/vodafone.html

Increasing LLU footprint by up to 58, covering 60% of home phone lines.... fingers crossed they get my exchange.

edit - removed "to merge" as it was incorrect...

Jonathan

Disaster

The_Conductor

Whys it a disaster? Its a proper competitor for Eircon at long last. Let the battle commence.......

ongarite

Jonathan wrote: »

Disaster

Why?
They offer the same basic internet bundle packages for prices cheaper than Eircom & Vodafone have probably a better chance of expanding with their free Vodafone mobile calls included in their packages.

The_Conductor

Jonathan wrote: »

Disaster

Only if you have shares in Eircon!

Onikage

Value of €4.8m? Sounds low for 84,000 customers and 3,000 small businesses.

Jonathan

I'm with BT, and very happy with them.

This most likely means a raft of changes for the customer, including new packages, new tech support and a new billing system, not to mention a slapped together backhaul similar to UPC's cable management, cablelink and cablevision networks.

Onikage

Jonathan wrote: »

a new billing system

Judging from the comments on this forum, that could only be a massive improvement.

Jonathan

Onikage wrote: »

Judging from the comments on this forum, that could only be a massive improvement.

Never had any problems myself. New bill layout etc now.

jor el

I don't see how this does anything for broadband in Ireland. Neither BT nor Vodafone are competition for eircom, as they are both mainly re-sellers. BT's LLU is tiny, no more than a PR exercise really.

Getting rid of BT's legendary billing system would be a major improvement, but I honestly can't see them migrating all the existing customers off of this and onto Vodafone's.

watty

BT Ireland is to transfer its consumer and small business broadband customers, as well as its voice telephone customers, to Vodafone under an agreement between the two telecoms companies.

Not a merger.

The only bit of BT Ireland worth much is the CIE-ESAT and other ESAT fibre infrastructures. Vodafone needs access to that for LLU and Mobile Mast backhaul.

Somewhile ago we heard that BT was pulling out of Retail, now we know how.

There are over 20 ISPs in a country big enough for maybe 2 to 4, 6 at outside. Expect more consolidation.

Fake competition of reselling LLU or Bitstream does not make real money (except for eircom) and does nothing to increase our broadband infrastructure.

This makes no real difference to anyone on broadband. It does mean a very little something for Vodafone Mobile users perhaps. But Vodafone would have been buying BT (CIE-ESAT) fibre capacity anyway.

Re: BT Billing
Some amount of BT employees are transferring to Vodafone. That would be the billing?
Perlico (now Vodafone) customers still get Perlico bills?

Maybe the bills will be printed on Perlico paper, but from EXACT same system operated by same staff, but under Vodafone ownership.

dub45

watty wrote: »

Not a merger.

The only bit of BT Ireland worth much is the CIE-ESAT and other ESAT fibre infrastructures. Vodafone needs access to that for LLU and Mobile Mast backhaul.

Somewhile ago we heard that BT was pulling out of Retail, now we know how.

There are over 20 ISPs in a country big enough for maybe 2 to 4, 6 at outside. Expect more consolidation.

Fake competition of reselling LLU or Bitstream does not make real money (except for eircom) and does nothing to increase our broadband infrastructure.

This makes no real difference to anyone on broadband. It does mean a very little something for Vodafone Mobile users perhaps. But Vodafone would have been buying BT (CIE-ESAT) fibre capacity anyway.

Re: BT Billing
Some amount of BT employees are transferring to Vodafone. That would be the billing?
Perlico (now Vodafone) customers still get Perlico bills?

Maybe the bills will be printed on Perlico paper, but from EXACT same system operated by same staff, but under Vodafone ownership.

Just so long as they leave the BT billing system behind them!:rolleyes:

dgently

watty wrote: »

Not a merger.

The only bit of BT Ireland worth much is the CIE-ESAT and other ESAT fibre infrastructures. Vodafone needs access to that for LLU and Mobile Mast backhaul.

Surprised to see you post such a poorly informed analysis Watty. BT has a great network, Vodafone has marketing and strategic advantages. Should be a good deal for both sets of customers.

kaizersoze

Watty is correct. It's not a merger.

It's no secret that BT have wanted out of the residential market for a while now.
All BT are doing is off loading it's low/no profit customers to Vodafone and throwing in fibre access to sweeten the deal.
No benefit to consumers or broadband in general.

dgently

kaizersoze wrote: »

Watty is correct. It's not a merger.

True, it was confusing of me to leave that in the quoted text. It is certainly not a merger.

watty

dgently wrote: »

Surprised to see you post such a poorly informed analysis Watty. BT has a great network, Vodafone has marketing and strategic advantages. Should be a good deal for both sets of customers.

BT still has (mostly the original CIE-ESAT fibre BT bought with ESAT, maps are online). They are only off loading the worthless bit that that they have to pay rental for each customer (even on LLU) to eircom for.

Makes no difference to customers really. I bet vodafone bought the BT retail billing to avoid cost of migration of customers.

Gives Vodafone more captive audience to sell mobile bundle too (same as perlico purchase but much cheaper).

Gets BT out of loss making/break even retail and only wholesaling the network (separate to eircom, unlike Bitstream, LLU and phone business).

Cabaal

This could be a very positive move in relation to an actual real threat to Eircom as BT both use LLU and Bit-stream products which will now be combined with Vodafones Perlico offers of ADSL and Vodafones offers of Midband products.

Overall it should be a pretty strong company when it comes up against Eircom and it has the money to make investments too which is extremely important

TheDriver

it is a good deal as I was thinking of changing to Vodafone from BT because for 1 euro extra a month, i go from calls inclusive 1mb with a 10gb limit to calls inclusive, 3mb with 30gb limit and 3 hours vodafone mobile calls a month. wonder will everyone be transferred onto the new vodafone packages??

jor el

Considering that Vodafone bought Perlico, and then kept the two separate, and are still selling them as individual packages, I'd say there won't be any change to BT customers, except perhaps they might get inclusive calls to Vodafone numbers (for those paying for the bundled call packages maybe) in the same way that eircom give free Meteor calls on theirs.

The packages, websites, etc will probably not change at all. If you're considering a move to Vodafone because you like the Vodafone package, then go for it.

dubhthach

This nicely ties in with the deal they did with E-Net to get access to the MAN's (Metropolitan Area Network's) see:
http://www.e-net.ie/news.php?newsid=64

Most of the unbundled exchanges outside of Dublin happen to have connections to the MAN's.

Cabaal

jor el wrote: »

..... except perhaps they might get inclusive calls to Vodafone numbers (for those paying for the bundled call packages maybe) in the same way that eircom give free Meteor calls on theirs. t.

Comreg ruled that eircom had to suspend selling that package (free calls to Meteor) pending the outcome of a investigation in respect of unfair business practices.

As such this package is not available at present, at present they only appear to give mobile offers along the lines of x free min a month

Gwynston

Cabaal wrote: »

Comreg ruled that eircom had to suspend selling that package (free calls to Meteor) pending the outcome of a investigation in respect of unfair business practices.

As such this package is not available at present, at present they only appear to give mobile offers along the lines of x free min a month

I just did a search and got offered the bundled Meteor calls:
'eircom recommends this product'

kierank01

Does anyone know how this might affect BT's free calls to the uk?

jor el

No one knows anything about the particulars at this stage, and it will likely be quite a while before they do know.

Fratton Fred

kierank01 wrote: »

Does anyone know how this might affect BT's free calls to the uk?

hopefully it won't. who knows, you may even get Vodafone ireland to Vodafone UK calls included. Now that would be worth a fortune to me.

Magnet: Rory

As an employee of Magnet, I am aware that there may be some unease at the recent news of BT’s sale of its residential customers to Vodafone.

In case people are unaware or upset that they had no choice in picking a new broadband provider I thought it would be prudent to mention that Magnet can offer the fastest un-contended (no sharing) broadband services in Ireland, up to 24Mb, in addition to phone bundles and TV on your PC with Magnet’s PCTV service.

Magnet can provide the fastest broadband that your telephone line can produce.

As a special offer to ex BT customers Magnet is offering a 10% discount on all 24Mb Broadband connections up until the end of August.

If you’re interested in talking to us about your broadband connection I can be contacted via private message.

Greyfox

Magnet (Rory) wrote: »

As an employee of Magnet, I am aware that there may be some unease at the recent news of BT’s sale of its residential customers to Vodafone.

In case people are unaware or upset that they had no choice in picking a new broadband provider I thought it would be prudent to mention that Magnet can offer the fastest un-contended (no sharing) broadband services in Ireland, up to 24Mb, in addition to phone bundles and TV on your PC with Magnet’s PCTV service.

Magnet can provide the fastest broadband that your telephone line can produce.

As a special offer to ex BT customers Magnet is offering a 10% discount on all 24Mb Broadband connections up until the end of August.

If you’re interested in talking to us about your broadband connection I can be contacted via private message.

Why would their be unease? I can't see any reason why this could have a negative effect on BT customers especially with the fact that theirs BT employees moving to Vodaphone! Your targets in magnet must be tough if you need to advertise on boards.

Eh every Broadband company can provide the fastest broadband that any persons line can produce...it's just that most peoples lines can get nowhere near 24Mb with any company!

Maboza

Greyfox wrote: »

Why would their be unease? I can't see any reason why this could have a negative effect on BT customers especially with the fact that theirs BT employees moving to Vodaphone! Your targets in magnet must be tough if you need to advertise on boards.

Eh every Broadband company can provide the fastest broadband that any persons line can produce...it's just that most peoples lines can get nowhere near 24Mb with any company!

Ahem..

Cabaal

Magnet (Rory) wrote: »

As an employee of Magnet, I am aware that there may be some unease at the recent news of BT’s sale of its residential customers to Vodafone.

In case people are unaware or upset that they had no choice in picking a new broadband provider I thought it would be prudent to mention that Magnet can offer the fastest un-contended (no sharing) broadband services in Ireland, up to 24Mb, in addition to phone bundles and TV on your PC with Magnet’s PCTV service.

Magnet can provide the fastest broadband that your telephone line can produce.

As a special offer to ex BT customers Magnet is offering a 10% discount on all 24Mb Broadband connections up until the end of August.

If you’re interested in talking to us about your broadband connection I can be contacted via private message.

Rory please see my PM.

In relation to your comments, your basis for this uncertainly is unfounded at this stage as historical views prove otherwise, example in point being Vodafone buyout of Perlico and the fact that this to date has changed little for existing Perlico customers.

Given that Vodafone's deal is not even a "sale" as such and merely a partnership to switch customers over to Vodafone so they will deal with customers on the front end of things which its been obvious that BT wanted to get out of for some time.

Lets stay relevant on this and avoid speculation like this

Finally on a separate matter, Maboza if you have nothing helpful to add to this forum other then picking at grammar I'd recommend you don't continue to post.

hellboy99

Just got this email from BT:

BaconZombie

When did Smart Telecom stop offering a 24Mib non-contended ADSL2+ service?

Magnet (Rory) wrote: »

Magnet can offer the fastest un-contended (no sharing) broadband services in Ireland, up to 24Mb, in addition to phone bundles and TV on your PC with Magnet’s PCTV service.

Magnet can provide the fastest broadband that your telephone line can produce.