Virgin Media plan to exit corporate telecoms
August 7, 2008
Virgin Media has signaled their plans to exit the corporate telecoms market. Chief executive Neil Berkett wants to concentrate on encouraging more cable TV and broadband customers to join.
If sold the division, which hooks small businesses up to local authority contracts, could bring in £600m for Virgin.
Investment bank Goldman Sachs have created a plan to combine the Virgin operation with Thus, which is being bought by Cable & Wireless for £329m. The plan, which has been talked over with Thus, would receive private equity money injected into the enlarged group. A reseller agreement that means traffic would still be carried on Virgins network has also been prepared.
The business division of Virgin had sales of £642m last year, however they have warned this will fall. It makes a profit of £100m according to estimates by bankers.
Another candidate for the merger could be KCOM, however the former Kingston Communications is not thought to be injected.
Mr Berkett is also discussing the future of Virgin’s content division, including a half share in UKTV and the Bravo and Trouble channels. Virgin are due to issue second-quarter figures on Thursday. They are still trying to resolve the standoff with BSkyB over the carriage of each other’s channels.
Visit www.virginmedia.com for more information.
Comments
Got something to say?
Advertisement