Oops! NTL - is this good or bad news?

dub45

There goes the 3mb upgrade anyway!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

From todays Irish Times

NTL sale of Irish unit may net up to €200m



The owners of cable firm NTL are to sell its Irish division in a deal that could be worth €150-€200 million, writes Jamie Smyth, Technology Reporter. The sale should be concluded by April and at least one Irish consortium is in the running to buy it.

International investment bank Goldman Sachs is advising NTL on the sale and has invited several prospective Irish and international bidders to consider the company.

NTL Ireland is the State's biggest cable supplier with more than 340,000 customers in Dublin, Galway and Waterford. Its US owner, NTL Group, was rescued from bankruptcy last year by a consortium of banks and hedge funds.

The Irish Times has learned that a consortium of wealthy Irish investors is preparing a bid and has approached NTL. The group is being advised by financial advisers IBI Corporate Finance.

International cable firm UGC Europe Communications, owned by US media figure Mr John Malone, is also believed to be preparing a bid. Last month it bought NTL's Irish rival, Chorus Communications.

A spokesman for UGC said yesterday that as the largest European cable firm it would look at opportunities as they arose.

He said the firm did not comment on specific cases.

NTL Ireland is likely to be sold for a fraction of the €680 million purchase price that NTL paid for the company back in 1999 during the hype of the dotcom bubble.

UGC paid a multiple of approximately 6.9 times estimated 2004 earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation for Chorus. Using a similar formula it is estimated that NTL could sell for up to €200 million.

But any prospective buyers of NTL Ireland are likely to have to invest tens of millions of euro to upgrade its network to supply broadband internet technology.

Slutmonkey57b

Yep. Another O'Reilly/eircom fiasco in the making if an Irish group buys it.

gline

Slutmonkey57b wrote:

Yep. Another O'Reilly/eircom fiasco in the making if an Irish group buys it.

Yeh it would seem that way, bunch of cowboys, lol

Zena

Well NTL are crap at the moment - their customer service is terrible - just like Eircom. So one would hope that they could only improve!

gline

i thought NTL broadband is the best at the moment , from what i heard from friends of mine the package is great, though i their you are right their customer service is supposed to be crap as i see from reading some of the posts on boards

jimmycrackcorm

Their customer service is brilliant. In fact I've never had to ring them so I'm getting a fantastic service.

daymobrew

I'll second the praise for the broadband service. I love it. When I think back to my dial-up days (and I worked at home for over a year with dial-up!) it brings a tear to my eye. I'm a stronger man for that suffering.

Since I don't use ntl tv service (though it is installed to get bb; have Sky+) I've only had to call customer service twice - both times related to local powercuts - just to inform them of the issue. When I used the digital TV service I was on the phone to them all the time. I know my account number by heart.

Hopefully this sale won't affect the happy broadband customers.

lomb

yep if anyone buys it thel just sack all the old foggies who work there, stil the only way thel gear it up for resale is if they increase revenues and we all know cablelink is dieing a slow death so they must tie everyone in and connect everyone rapidly for broadband so cant be all bad surely....

Infini

Hopefully they'll introduce an improved service and we might even get the upgrade to 3MB beforehand. Besides if it improves the broadband service I wouldn't mind a bit.

Mantel

The broadband services is great but the customer services could do with a bit of an improvement. As long as whoever buys NTL doesn't starting enforceing a cap, doesn't hike the price up and doesn't turn in to another Eircom I don't really mind.

Denis O'Brien had an intrest in it before, maybe he's going to have another go.

jimmycrackcorm

Infini wrote:

Hopefully they'll introduce an improved service and we might even get the upgrade to 3MB beforehand. Besides if it improves the broadband service I wouldn't mind a bit.

According to the uk forums, NTL aren't upgrading the speeds until much later this year as they are concentrating on VOD from this month. I doubt if any new taskmaster would see the benefits of increased speeds but attempt to achieve quick profitibility instead to satisfy the bankers that will no doubt provide their finance.

Lessons learned from Valentias cash withdrawal from eircom anyone?

Infini

Mantel wrote:

The broadband services is great but the customer services could do with a bit of an improvement. As long as whoever buys NTL doesn't starting enforceing a cap, doesn't hike the price up and doesn't turn in to another Eircom I don't really mind.

Denis O'Brien had an intrest in it before, maybe he's going to have another go.

Too true mate. If they offer much higher download caps that are almost impossible to go over, increase the speeds and drop the price, or at the very least keep the service as good or even better than it is now, I'd be more than happy to accept the change.

Raskolnikov

I imagine that future roll-out on NTL broadband into new areas will be put in hiatus. I wonder how many people here held out for NTL to come to them . . .

MrPinK

Raskolnikov wrote:

I wonder how many people here held out for NTL to come to them . . .

They should have known better. I've waiting since they were still called Cablelink. "Hopefully by the 1st quarter of next year" actually means "we have no idea when, or even if, your area will even be upgraded".

Snake Plisken

This is terrible news, I've never had any issue with NTL and their Analog TV and Broadband service I have with them is excellent, my folks live in a Chorus area and the TV service is crap always breaking down, if u think NTL customer service is crap well u haven't experienced Chorus, also no capping on downloads is great and we'll probably lose the Setanta Sports channel as well! Lets hope its not true and that some bunch of Cowboys don't get their grubby hands on it!!!!!!

Snake

eth0_

It'd be brill if someone like Telewest bought out NTL Ireland.

jimmycrackcorm

The real question is what is going to happen to the promised €100 million broadband rollout now which seems to have been put into action judging by the number of new areas added to rollout.

- consider the plan to spend €100 mill versus the sale value of up to €200 mil. I reckon there will be no new areas added until at least the new owner is in place and only then whether thhey can justify the investment.

Infini

eth0_ wrote:

It'd be brill if someone like Telewest bought out NTL Ireland.

Your right there. I've heard they have a great broadband package over in the UK.

Capt'n Midnight

but suppose Eircom bought them out and then for techical reasons couldn't maintain the broadband service, people would have to get ADSL instead.

If only the decode box for digital had an ethernet port for data and an RJ 11 for voice...

NTL's 350,000 customers pay at least €10 per month over the odds on eircom line rental (if they boxes didn't burn out)

or they could offer broadband/voice without TV

or they could offer channels that wern't on SKY

or they could do like eircom and invest nothing and run it into the ground.

lee_baby_simms

Well their broadband service is savage. 750 beauty, 30gb cap, 35 bucks...stop the lights...

Infini

I doubt Eircom will get their hands on it. They're a creaky ship as it is and have their own problems. Most likely it'lll either be the consortium that owns Chorus and a cable internet provider in belgium or an American or UK company.

Raoul Duke

I'd say the competition authority would have something to say if Eircom tried to buy NTL.

If they are bought by a bunch of investors with no previous or current presence in broadband or cable television then you can kiss goodbye those great upgrades that kept the few lucky customers who got their broadband here in line with the UK. They would have no need to keep up with the UK. All they will have to do is compete with the expensive and heavily capped DSL which won't be hard.

If the management of NTL are gearing their company for sale I'd imagine that they would cut back heavily on investment in their infrastructure. They want to be able to show of the best possible Balance Sheet and leaking cash upgrading the network would damage the Balance Sheet in the short term.

As one of the many that have been waiting for that postcard telling us we are now eligible for cable broadband, I think this is bad news. It depends on who buys them of course but better the devil you know.

Lex_Diamonds

This is *not* good news. We should now expect the company to be shifted to Irish style management, by that I mean all broadband upgrades/rollouts will be put on hold, prices will be hiked across the board and the company will generally take on an anti-consumer stance in line with our national telephone provider "eirsat".

I'd love to think the above was just idle cynicism...

richardo

I started working with 'em when they were RTE Relays [ah - the good old days].

RTE Relays bought out Dublin Cablesystems and became Cablelink.
RTE's shares in Cablelink were bought by Eircom [that's when I got out!!]
Eircom then sold out to NTL.

So, I would think it is very unlikely Eircom are going to buy it back again ....

fatherdougalmag

What about UTV?

kin9pin

fatherdougalmag wrote:

What about UTV?

Nooooooooooooooooo please! Won't somebody think of the children!

Infini

kin9pin wrote:

Nooooooooooooooooo please! Won't somebody think of the children!

In anycase whoever buys NTL ireland better not do a balls job and screw the customers over. :mad:

ando

fatherdougalmag wrote:

What about UTV?

oh dear god, somebody get a gun

halenger

Someone who's big into digital and broadband would be who we want.

Someone who sees that a lotta ground work has been done and can be done for cable and wants to screw Eircom as painfully as possible. :P

Guess we'll see over the next few months.

CyberGhost

kin9pin wrote:

Nooooooooooooooooo please! Won't somebody think of the children!

Mayor Quimby says no!

oceanclub

Hmm, as someone about the make the jump to NTL... should I still go for it?

P.