The Smart, the Witch and the Wardobe.

watty

How much are Smart's woe's the failure of LLU & DSL regulataion 10 years ago, or Dishonest marketing + below cost selling of Mobile Data packages now?

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/finance/2009/0829/1224253464864.html

THE OWNERS of Smart Telecom are expected to seek the approval of the High Court on Monday to enter examinership, a move that would protect the debt-laden group from its creditors for up to 100 days.

kaizersoze

Marvelous. Switched over to them in May. Looks like I'll be moving again.

Suppose it's no wonder they're in debt, they haven't billed or taken money from me yet.:rolleyes:

PogMoThoin

Bet the Vodafone vultures are circling

Galen

Sad day.

watty

If someone owes €60M or €52M (depending on how you count it), or owes €4Billion, it can be cheaper to buy the wreckage than the going concern.

I still don't get STT's plan.

bk

I wonder what this means for my apartment development that is exclusively Smart? Smart are already pulling out their TV service in my development in September (fortunately Sky are now available, however they are taking ages to install and I might end up having no TV for a few weeks).

I'm more worried about phone and BB as there is no alternative (no mobile bb is not an alternative) and I work from home a lot and depend on these.

This goes to show the dangers of these sort of exclusive setups.

BTW I'm very sorry to see Smart in this sort of difficulty, for a long time they added desperately needed competition to the market and many of their staff are really great and helpful. I hope things work out for them.

croo

bk wrote: »

BTW I'm very sorry to see Smart in this sort of difficulty, for a long time they added desperately needed competition to the market and many of their staff are really great and helpful. I hope things work out for them.

Yeah, I'm not a customer (or employee) but I have only heard good things about them and normally people only tell you about a service when it's rubbish so I guess theirs must have been pretty good. It's a sad state of affairs but it seems to me their problems are because they spent too much time delivering a good & efficient service to their customers and not enough playing politics!

watty

Also here (similar article)
http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/examiner-to-be-appointed--to-embattled-telco-firm-smart-1872797.html


Smart's plan always seemed to be to build up a customer base and get bought out (Esat --> BT). Without a major regulatory change it was never going to be profitable. We had this discussion back in 2006? when eircom cut off their retail resale customers.

bealtine

watty wrote: »

Also here (similar article)
We had this discussion back in 2006?

It seems we've been having this discussion for a long time.
Until DECNR and Comreg wake up we'll continue having this discussion.

The sad demise of Smart clearly shows that artificial "competition" in the Irish marketplace is not working and the rules need to be revisited urgently.

Sponge Bob

Sky and O2 and Carphone warehouse are watching of course but an examinership does not always lead to a sale .....more to a concrete valuation the examiner can work off I would think

The debts are a legacy from Oisin Fannings stewardship .

Crann na Beatha

This post has been deleted.

trekkypj

I'm very sorry to hear about this. Anyone I know who had an account with Smart have praised the service.

I would imagine Vodafone will make an offer for the business. They seem to want to expand into fixed line business, given their takeover of BT Ireland's business. Smart have a good reputation for customer service, generally. Seems a shame that they couldn't make a proper go of it.

Then again, what do we expect when regulation in this country is a joke?

bealtine

trekkypj wrote: »

Then again, what do we expect when regulation in this country is a joke?

The fault for this failure can be laid firmly at the door of Comreg...

kaimera

ah bollocks.

there's nothing on the web these days anyway but still, had no problems with Smart.

what now for us users?

trekkypj

bealtine wrote: »

The fault for this failure can be laid firmly at the door of Comreg...

Ah the same old tune. I was afraid of that.

All we need is the very late Percy French to compose a humorous song about it all and the transformation from disgrace to farce will be complete.

Are you right there Eamon are you right?
Your internet connection is in strife.... etc.....

watty

However while it's mostly a Regulator failure, IBB, Smart and others thought they could replicate the buyout of ESat.

But Esat had real infrastructure of their own (fibre/CIE) for BT to buy and a real independent Mobile Phone system/Licence for O2/Telefonica to buy.

Ultimately IBB & Smart have High Debt and Customers with a dusting of Infrastructure. Imagine (IBBs new owner) appears to be now dumping Ripwave for a mix of unspecified WiMax and Breeze.

Steffano2002

kaizersoze wrote: »

Marvelous. Switched over to them in May. Looks like I'll be moving again.

Suppose it's no wonder they're in debt, they haven't billed or taken money from me yet.:rolleyes:

Was just thinking that myself! With them for 4 months now and still no money taken out!

stephenc_ie

There's a press release up on
http://www.smarttelecom.ie/media/09-08-31/Smart_Telecom_to_enter_Examinership.aspx

and a forum post too:
http://support.smarttelecom.ie/forums/showthread.php?t=3421

Jumpy

You forget that Chorus went into Examinership once, and they are now owned by one of the biggest ISP's in Europe.
Examinership is nothing to panic about, it sometimes leads to bigger and better things.

Now receivership...

cgarvey

watty wrote: »

How much are Smart's woe's the failure of LLU & DSL regulataion 10 years ago, or Dishonest marketing + below cost selling of Mobile Data packages now?

And how much is down to Smart not recognising the regulatory failure (agreed, that that is a disgrace) before running in to the mess, guns blazing.

trekkypj

Well, at least it's not a winding up order. It's true that examinership is often used to resolve problematic financial issues before being taken over by new investors.

So if a company becomes insolvent, it allows them breathing space and prevents major creditors from applying for a winding up order for a period of time (100 days). After that I think a judge can extend it if there is a prospect of the company continuing as a going concern, or of being sold, though I'm not an expert.

RangeR

bk wrote: »

I wonder what this means for my apartment development that is exclusively Smart?

bealtine wrote: »

The sad demise of Smart clearly shows that artificial "competition" in the Irish marketplace is not working and the rules need to be revisited urgently.

kaimera wrote: »

what now for us users?

Excuse me guys. Maybe I'm missing something. Smart are not gone. It's talk like this that has lead the majority of Irish people to think that Smart ceased trading years ago [2006???]
They are in examinership. This doesn't mean they have gone t!ts up.

Anywho, Call me an optimist but it's always nice to blow away the cobwebs from time to time.

bk

RangeR wrote: »

Excuse me guys. Maybe I'm missing something. Smart are not gone. It's talk like this that has lead the majority of Irish people to think that Smart ceased trading years ago [2006???]
They are in examinership. This doesn't mean they have gone t!ts up.

Well they maybe not gone, but in my apartment they are closing down their TV service from the 12th of September and since they are the only supplier of phone and BB in my apartment building, I've every right to be concerned.

thebman

Aren't they profitable but just debt ridden?

watty

The End.


http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/digiweb-to-take-on-smart-customers-1935829.html


Smart was an Illusion of competition. The Plan always seemed to me to sell below cost to get a big customer base quickly and then get bought out (Worked for Esat and to an extent for Perlico).

But Debts too high and Infrastructure too dependent on DSL and eircom. DSL is reaching EOL for Broadband. Smart had too little infrastructure and too high costs.

Not €50M in Debt as was claimed last year, but €90M. I simply don't believe the oft repeated claim of profitability over the last year. It seems no one who looked at the books believed it either.

The "1:1 Contention" performance was not sustainable at the Irish Costs and their Retail prices.

Some people (really mostly the 5% to 10% who do illegal P2P) don't like Digiweb's Data Limits or Throttling, but it is what ensures that they will still be there to serve you next year and that the 80% to 90% of normal users get a good service.
I'm 12.5km from mast. Fixed Wireless


Digiweb also do Bitstream DSL (but only make a couple of Euro a year per customer, eircom makes the money on that) and some LLU (That probably loses money) like Smart did.

Sadly all operators are losing some customers to now cheap Mobile 3G (3, Meteor, O2 & Vodaphone Wireless dongles) which is mis-sold as Broadband and can't compare even with basic DSL for speed or quality. The Mobile data is subsidized by Voice calls (same network) by maybe 150:1. See the excess data charges of up to €500 per Gigabyte to get idea of real costs of Mobile Data.

Smart had a good service, but at twice the price of Mobile and no profit how could they compete.
Given the limitations of DSL Speed versus Distance, Smart couldn't compete with UPC either as UPC upgrades their network.

thebman

So how are Digiweb handling the new customers?

Presumably they have to honor their existing contracts or give them a get out penalty free window if changing their contract.

Will it be rebranded or left as marketing to a different type of customer.

kaimera

thebman wrote: »

So how are Digiweb handling the new customers?

Presumably they have to honor their existing contracts or give them a get out penalty free window if changing their contract.

Will it be rebranded or left as marketing to a different type of customer.

From what I read; the smart brand will stay

RangeR

That's a fupping shame.