Virgin Media & O2 Merger/Joint Venture Provisionally Approved

[i.h]

Adding to my previous post - Vodafone are already a considerable force in fixed line. They own what was Cable and Wireless (presumably including the old Energis network?) and have their own home broadband ISP using the Openreach and Cityfibre networks.

3 are truly vulnerable, but they seem to think this fibre stuff is totally unnecessary anyway, 5G will be just as good. Time will tell.

)

In terms of MVNOs, I think Sky will be one to watch - whenever their deal with O2 is up, will they continue to buy services from their most direct competitor?

My wife moved from Three to Sky Mobile last year. The only problem is 4G coverage is noticeably worse in the places we visit, than Three was (though we only discovered that this week conducting some day trips because of the lockdown easing!)

I migrated from Vodafone to EE 8 years ago, I'm in no rush to move, though I did ring them a few weeks ago saying I was thinking of leaving, as a method to obtain a better deal, and all they offered me was a smaller data allowance for slightly more cost per month! Technically I find their coverage and reliability rock solid.

I had much the same experience a few years ago, doesn't seem like much has changed. I've been on either T-Mobile/3/EE since and even when travelling in the rural parts of the south it's been fine. T-Mobile and 3 had a deep network sharing agreement and it really helped - I could get 3.5G in places where VF and O2 were barely offering GPRS, though I'm not sure how much of that survived the move to 4G/5G

Might be worth looking into one of the EE MVNOs, I'm on BT mobile and don't really notice much of a difference now that 4G and WiFi calling are supported, though I do really wish they did eSIMs. If you happen to have BT broadband they offer some sort of a discount too

[mici01]

I know that in the Netherlands, similar to the upcoming O2/Virgin merger, Liberty Global's Ziggo (pay TV) also manages a JV with Vodafone.

Yes and in NL they kept both brands, but mainly for the reason that both brands we're equaly strong. They use Ziggo for the cable side and their TV channels and Vodafone for mobile.

Interestingly, O2 actually operate a TV service in Germany. In addition to it's own live TV service, which it operates in co-operation with waipu.tv, It also offers Sky Ticket, the german answer to NOW, and Netflix.

And there is o2 TV in the Czech Republic. Even though o2 CZ isn't owned by Telefonica any more they still license the brand, because it's so strong in the country.

Other than in Germany the Czech o2 TV isn't just a rebadged streaming service. It's more comparible to BT TV in the UK (also because they have the exclusive rights to the UEFA Champions League and the Czech First League).

[James Martin]

Could we see an IP version of the existing TV service appear in non-cabled areas?

[i.h]

Could we see an IP version of the existing TV service appear in non-cabled areas?

Would they bother putting that sort of investment into something that is possibly on its way out anyway?

Sky have yet to bother (except for Now TV) and they already have all the pieces of the puzzle, including a truly nationwide broadband network & the financial and technical backing of a company that's doing it all already

[James Martin]

Could we see an IP version of the existing TV service appear in non-cabled areas?

Would they bother putting that sort of investment into something that is possibly on its way out anyway?

Sky have yet to bother (except for Now TV) and they already have all the pieces of the puzzle, including a truly nationwide broadband network & the financial and technical backing of a company that's doing it all already

You make a good point!

I do wonder what the future holds for "multichannel television" as we've known it since 1989 - since the vast majority of these channels don't air live programmes anyway. So why not move to VOD?

Although I've got a Virgin V6 box at the moment, I'd probably be willing to live with a Freeview PVR & a Roku device if I could keep my 500MB broadband. To be honest, I only have the Virgin box a) for the PVR and b) because it came as a package with the broadband. I do have a Now TV Entertainment Pass, prinicpally for my bedroom (a) it's simply not worth drilling Virgin lines up there b) I've no coax socket and c) the telly isn't smart) but every time I try to cancel it they throw me a rediculously good offer to keep it.

And of course, most people now are actually quite happy to just have Freeview and the OTT services, which offers a choice far greater than Sky or Cable gave you in the 90s anyway. Amazon in particular, most people have via their Prime subscription already!

Ironically, it's right now YouView could really come into its own. For most people, one box that has:

• Freeview HD
  a PVR
  iPlayer
  ITV Hub
  All4
  whatever C5's VOD service is called
  Netflix
  Amazon
  Disney+
  Now TV (as it is on the Roku-based devices)
  BT Sport
  (have I missed anything apart from YouTube?)

...is geuniely all they're going to need in years to come I reckon. Sky Movies' linear channels already have a charmed life (why are they there?!) but we already know from Amazon streaming EPL matches that it's now possible to do that and not break the internet! I wouldn't be surprised if later this decade Amaazon, and maybe even Netflix, snap up a major portion of the EPL rights from Sky Sports. That'll be a huge game-changer. I'm not backing a horse on my gut, but I can't ignore the fact that there are people out there now with pockets deeper than Sky.

[Keith]

Ironically, it's right now YouView could really come into its own. For most people, one box that has:

• Freeview HD
  a PVR
  iPlayer
  ITV Hub
  All4
  whatever C5's VOD service is called
  Netflix
  Amazon
  Disney+
  Now TV (as it is on the Roku-based devices)
  BT Sport
  (have I missed anything apart from YouTube?)

...is geuniely all they're going to need in years to come I reckon.

Going slightly off-topic a couple months ago I purchased a Manhattan T3-R. This gave access to the Freeview (inc HD) channels, on demand catchup TV, recording, and Britbox. Sadly they don't yet have the other subscription / pay TV apps, though apparently those services aren't yet allowing them to be on their devices (but I gather they're hoping to be able add them).

I axed my Virgin Media account and opted for one of these boxes, as within about a year it'll have paid for itself by the amount I'm saving. For Netflix I now opt to use our PS4. I think the only thing I miss is being able to skip the adds via Virgin's own catchup service.

[London Lite]

In all honesty, I don't need a PVR. Linear Freeview without Freeview Play, plus a Nvidia Shield and an Amazon Firestick give me all I need for legal catch-up tv.

[Rexogamer]

Here's what the market share for each of the operators will look like after the merger:

Doesn't Tesco use O2 for their network? Then again, if they were counting MVNOs as part of the share for the operator Virgin would be under Voda which would be a bit odd given the context

What surprises me though is that BT's share is so big and Voda's is so small - EE might be big but I wouldn't think that much of the market would be theirs

[AlfieMulcahy]

Here's what the market share for each of the operators will look like after the merger:

Doesn't Tesco use O2 for their network? Then again, if they were counting MVNOs as part of the share for the operator Virgin would be under Voda which would be a bit odd given the context

What surprises me though is that BT's share is so big and Voda's is so small - EE might be big but I wouldn't think that much of the market would be theirs

EE on its own is ~27%

[James Martin]

In all honesty, I don't need a PVR. Linear Freeview without Freeview Play, plus a Nvidia Shield and an Amazon Firestick give me all I need for legal catch-up tv.

I like a PVR to spool through ads, and in the case of ITV, have HD. You also don't get Dolby 5.1 audio, at least not on iPlayer.

[James Martin]

Ironically, it's right now YouView could really come into its own. For most people, one box that has:

• Freeview HD
  a PVR
  iPlayer
  ITV Hub
  All4
  whatever C5's VOD service is called
  Netflix
  Amazon
  Disney+
  Now TV (as it is on the Roku-based devices)
  BT Sport
  (have I missed anything apart from YouTube?)

...is geuniely all they're going to need in years to come I reckon.

Going slightly off-topic a couple months ago I purchased a Manhattan T3-R. This gave access to the Freeview (inc HD) channels, on demand catchup TV, recording, and Britbox. Sadly they don't yet have the other subscription / pay TV apps, though apparently those services aren't yet allowing them to be on their devices (but I gather they're hoping to be able add them).

I axed my Virgin Media account and opted for one of these boxes, as within about a year it'll have paid for itself by the amount I'm saving. For Netflix I now opt to use our PS4. I think the only thing I miss is being able to skip the adds via Virgin's own catchup service.

That box sounds great! It's basically YouView on steroids from what I can see. If they can get all the big OTT players on there they'll have a perfect product.

[DJ Dave]

To be fair, the Virgin Brand is better then the previous NTL: or NTL:Telewest as it was for a short time, I do agree Virgin Mobile use to be a great network when I first went with them buying a phone in Virgin Megastores back then. Like it was posted above, Virgin our good unless you have to get in touch and with most being overseas it is a nightmare to get anything sorted.

I use to like the One2One brand adverts, I'd like to have a "one2one with" but also the T-Mobile mob idents were great, my first phone was on Orange a Motorola M3788e on "all calls" :lol:

[James Martin]

Virgin are great but as James says, their customer service is very poor. Back at Christmas 2008 I had a terrible problem with slow speeds. The Indian call centre sent out multiple new modems, turn it off and on again, tried to argue it was a peak time ("it is like a road Mr James") and seemed unable to deviate from the script. My then 50MB connection remained at sub-dial up speeds. I had to ring up retentions and threaten to cancel unless I was put through to someone in the UK who could understand the nuanced situation I had. Eventually an engineer came out and told me it was an upgrade to DOCSIS 3 on that part of the network that caused it.

Thankfully they now use a text based chat system, and I managed to get upgraded to 500MB for a small bill increase and free Sky Movies for a month. But they were still all "Do you want Sky Sports or Sky Movies" rather than upgrading the Internet speed...

[WillPS]

Sky Movies' linear channels already have a charmed life (why are they there?!)

Sky don't have a product which allows on demand content to be accessed from hotel rooms yet.

The basic non-PVR Sky HD box they install gives the standard message about connecting to broadband for on demand services but I've yet to find one which is actually connected, and the Sky remote in hotel rooms has all the playback/on demand options changed to standard 'hotel' type buttons.

[AllWillBeWell]

Sky Movies' linear channels already have a charmed life (why are they there?!)

Sky don't have a product which allows on demand content to be accessed from hotel rooms yet.

The basic non-PVR Sky HD box they install gives the standard message about connecting to broadband for on demand services but I've yet to find one which is actually connected, and the Sky remote in hotel rooms has all the playback/on demand options changed to standard 'hotel' type buttons.

Reminds me of the hotel tv setup you sometimes had in the early 00s where the main reception had 10 Sky boxes on the go, in the hotel rooms you would switch to a analogue channel and be able to watch movies or sport. This was abroad. I only realised sometimes when it rained and suddenly there was a no satellite signal is being received message via the Sky EPG! I have also encountered it in the UK in bed and breakfast. I could request what to watch and the owner would change the channel. One morning his kids got hold of the remote and it was flicking all over the place as it was their main tv box which they used and the guest rooms only had a link to it. This was years ago now.