Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Liberty Media: Who are Formula 1's new owners?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-37307339

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Virgin Media plans 120 new jobs in Limerick and the Company will also expand its broadband offering in the mid-west region as well.

http://www.irishtimes.com/business/t...rick-1.2962285

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Virgin Media and BT announce upgrade plans to broadband service in High Barnet, Underhill and Friern Barnet.

http://www.borehamwoodtimes.co.uk/ne...her_out_wards/

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Irish Independent: Virgin Media backs new €3m TV3 drama as broadcaster develops indigenous programme output.

TV3 has secured funding from the Virgin Media group for a new €3m drama, as the broadcaster further develops its indigenous programme output.

TV3 also houses Virgin Media Solutions for the UK and Ireland, which is working on new 'addressable advertising' for the Virgin TV platform.

This will allow it to tailor ads to individuals.

http://mediaboyblog.blogspot.co.uk/2...dia-backs.html

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Presumably the "addressable advertising" would be similar to Sky's AdSmart?

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Oh I dunno..I've had a few episodes over the years of Docsis 3 being in congestion at peak times, but they've generally been solved in a few months. Frustrating at the time of course, but I'd still take that solution over a shared connection in the long term.

The current problems with error-319 on Sky & HD shows especially, could do with being sorted.. but that's quite obviously an asset-specific issue.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

About time. But quite why they haven't gone down the route or city and regional advertising years ago I don't know.

In the US if you're watching (for example) Nationals Geographic channel in New York, you get New York ads placed in instead of some of the national ads. They've done this for donkeys years over there. Nice revenue generator.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

There are regional stations around the UK and they do often show different ads. Back in Belfast, we had UTV instead of ITV. Programming was nearly identical but the ads and local news was different.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

That's not what I was describing at all though.

Imagine you're watching a national channel, such as ITV2, Discovery Channel or Sky News but 50% of the ads are local to where you are. The cable companies insert local adverts in the US, it's not done by the broadcaster.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Virgin Media Reports Preliminary Fiscal 2016 Results.

http://www.libertyglobal.com/pdf/pre...2016-FINAL.pdf

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Interesting that whilst VM increased its internet base by 214,100 customers, its TV base fell by 36,400.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Sky have a more compelling TV offering at the moment, and have been aggressively pricing it - market economics.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Virgins great strength is its broadband and will continue to be IMO long into the future Andrew.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

They are doing very well in terms of broadband. It's likely their fantastic offer on 50mb towards the end of 2016 helped towards their additions:

http://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php...-prosecco.html

"Similarly they’re no doubt mindful of the success that their on-going £18 per month special offer has been having for the standalone 50Mbps broadband package (£32.25 after the 12 month discount), which has been challenging the similarly priced ‘up to’ 17Mbps (ADSL2+) packages of rival ISPs."

On the TV front it's the same old story. Stagnant.

2010 - 3,729,600 TV customers

http://dtg.org.uk/news/news.html?id=3745

2016 - 3,729,100 TV customers

http://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php...and-users.html

If they keep running their cables out offering prosecco broadband and attractive bundle prices I can certainly see their TV uptake rocketing. I'm very interested in their cheap fast broadband.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Vodafone chief says Liberty deal is still ‘attractive’

https://www.ft.com/content/3699ceec-...8-3700c5664d30

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

For Vodafone maybe, but not LG.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Agreed. I suspect Vodafone is trying to talk up its share price!

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

God, I wish they'd just **** already.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

I Know lol

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

From a VF perspective the deal makes sense. From a consumer perspective it will have ramifications in some markets like Germany. Here in the U.K. It might even force the regulators hand where they push VM to open the cable network to other competitors a la Openreach.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Dream on. It won't happen.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

I don't see why that would happen, I know Voda owns some fibre but it's hardly monopoly territory, even with VM on top of it.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Sorry if I was not clear. I actually have serious doubts as to whether it will happen due to the regulatory issues.

Having said the above, I know there is also quite serious interest in the deal between parties involved. Let's see how the Netherlands experiment works out.

---------- Post added at 21:20 ---------- Previous post was at 21:18 ----------

It's not just the Fibre. It's the DOCSIS network. DOCSIS has recently been opened up in Australia as part of the NBM project so it is in the realms of possibility.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

DOCSIS (HFC) hasn't only recently been opened up in Australia. NBN was a project to transform broadband access and forced utilties providers to offer access through the exsiting duct/cable systems and then offload at the Edge network, this started pre 2010 and HFC access has been in play since 2010. In Australia you can have (for example) Telstra cable at home but be able to choose either Telstra or NBN for your connection, different CPE required and then the handover happens at the Edge network (CMTS). NBN also has access to proprietary FTTP and FTTN connections as well as upgraded a lot of existing copper plant to a mix of FTTP and VDSL2.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

There's no reason to open up the DOCSIS network, it was privately built and already has a public competitor with the OpenReach network.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

I think you perhaps have not kept pace with the story in recent years. Initially it was just an access agreement with NBM, however more recently this was renegotiated with both the Telstra and Optus HFC DOCSIS networks being completed sold to NBM rather than just gaining access to these networks. With that in mind, Telstra and Optus no longer sell these networks to customers. You can only now buy DOCSIS network access via NBM. In turn NBM supplies this to all the major providers, therefore turning the network into a multi-provider network which I believe is the first of its type globally. I am of course aware of the project here in the UK where BT shared its cable with Virgin in Westminster and Milton Keynes, but the project is Australia is many steps up from that.

As a side issue, the Optus HFC network whilst relatively new has been deemed to be worthless to the NBM project due to the large number of modems per node. It therefore is apparently going to be scrapped. The story is being re-spun by NBM is that this was all just a transfer agreement, but considering the re-negotiation back in 2014 turned the access agreement into a full transfer of ownership, its fairly obvious what is really going on based on the modem/node issue. Telstra's HFC network on the other hand is apparently still viable with obvious upgrades to the CMTS being required. How long it will maintain viability is questionable should providers decide to roll out higher speeds. Regardless the Telstra network is no longer Telstra's and instead now part of the larger NBM project going forwards. Apparently the first set of customers to move to NBM on cable fairly recently went live. :)

---------- Post added at 13:53 ---------- Previous post was at 13:51 ----------

We are not disagreeing with one another. Just relaying other parts of the story along with possible outcomes. Regulators have been re-looking at the strategy around this recently - in fact a good friend of mine has been working on the response. :)

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

US cable giant Liberty Global and European pay TV operator Sky have invested in Malaysia-based SVoD service iflix to help it expand into other markets.

http://www.c21media.net/sky-liberty-...0m-into-iflix/

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Liberty Global is “evaluating” whether to offer Amazon’s video service, after striking a global deal last year to distribute Netflix through its set-top boxes, according to Eric Tveter.

http://www.digitaltveurope.net/67020...n-partnership/

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

What, you mean like having the app on the box but not bundling a subscription with the service? Don't see how it could make a difference.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Presumably about dosh - how much do LGI make out of the deal, what's the formula? If it's too good a deal then maybe LGI's other content providers will want the same deal.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

This is partially what is driving the cable companies in the US to buy the content producers (e.g. Comcast now owns NBC Universal) as none of them want to simply be dumb-pipes for everyone else. That way even if customers cut the cord, they still buy content from the company but via another medium.

The problem with LG is that it has sold quite of content production over the years.

At the end of the day, IPTV is the future, whether that be for live streams or VOD.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

It's both, but VOD will be key.

Cloud based STB is the next step. No need for 2,3,4 hard drives in a STB, just record all your
content to a data centre in the cloud.

Your recordings become VOD, well you don't actually record.

Anyway, STBs as they are now will be a thing of the past in 3-4 years.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Well that was what the original TV Drive did. VM would record certain shows as they were broadcast and then you could then view them on demand. This was in the days before iPlayer and other things were common, and it didn't use the cable modem in the box but the actual cable tv infrastructure.

It was impressive technology wise, there was even a few behind the scenes things explaining it, basically a PVR running remotely and broadcasting like a tv channel what you were playing. Rewind/Fastforward worked much better than they do on any of the streaming services on VM's boxes, though there was a little bit of latency it didnt skip around like they do now, it was like using a locally recorded recording.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

I thought the problem with cloud recording was the copyright holders lost their **** at it and took anyone trying it to court? From my understanding, the "record for personal use" exemption only applies if it's recorded and stored on the personal premises.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Barring any 'off air' recording, the rest of that system is still the one used for the main On Demand service now i.e. all On Demand except BBC iPlayer on TiVo / V6.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Liberty Media owner on track for more motorsport acquisitions

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/...-acquisitions/

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Telefonica taps Liberty Global over O2 UK merger

https://www.mobileworldlive.com/feat...-o2-uk-merger/

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Also been knocking around for a while.

Makes more sense than a deal with Vodafone

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

02 is small fry and I don't see why Liberty would bother with it.

Vodafone is global and although it doesn't own half of Verizon now (America's biggest mobile co) it makes sense for a tie up between Liberty and Vodafone which I expect would then lead to a tie up with Verizon too.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Vodafone are currently crapping themselves. They've completely missed the boat. They have no TV offering, no content, no fixed lined access network.

In the UK, Vodafone have little to offer Virgin Media, all Vodafone can offer VM is their mobile market. VM have a thin MVNO deal with EE, just renewed, better broadband, TV, and Wifi.

And Vodafone are expensive. If VM wanted their own mobile network O2 would be the better option.

I've said on here for a lng time that A VM/Vodafone tie up is not impossible but it's extremely improbable.

Vodafone need it way more than VM/LG. Vodafone are behind the curve and they'll pay for it.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

I guess that the debate is would it be a merger just in the UK or globally or an exchange of assets? Vodafone has a bigger global presence than Liberty Global and is strong in TV in Spain and Germany.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Telefonica O2 are missing a very important asset: spectrum.


Let's see what happens. Personally I'm not really a betting man, but at the end of the day it will come down to the regulators, and not just the boardroom. If the Reg is right, we could be seeing the exit of VF from the UK market. HQ will probably move too.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Or they may just hive off the mobile side. Vodafone has a massive fibre optic backbone network and sub-sea cable portfolio that they acquired from C&W, both of which are no use to VM.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

I'm not sure they are of no use to VM, especially as VM charge a lot for their phone service.

Anyhow, let's see what happens. Whilst I don't want to bet on the outcome, I feel that this time something will happen (however large or small that may be).

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

What's that got to do with it?

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

They do offer a phone service and that includes international calls. Using their own cables can offer a reduction in price in some circumstances.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Nope, sorry but you obviously don't have a grasp of the industry. Which is fine.

"Phone calls" is a fraction of international traffic, plus you don't differentiate between voice/ data/IP at that level it is all transported the same way.

Trust me, Vodafones fibre network and subsea cables are of no interest to LG ( well maybe one) they are more of a liability.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

I should not have said calls. My fault! A few wines on a Friday.

Anyhow I personally don't believe that is a likely outcome of any asset swap anyhow. If LG buys VF assets, in the UK only mobile makes sense. This of course assumes that an asset swap is what eventuates.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Coming from someone in the industry... I dont see how this deal works. Its been talked up by media sources that don't understand how these companies operate. The VF spectrum is of little use at its current value to LG when other operators like O2 offer a much better return of investment for mobile spectrum. VF has a single asset that LG/VM could utilise while farming off the other elements of their fixed line networks, there is no strategic benefit to a merger/buyout from LG's perspective IMO.

The talks and rumours of talks have boosted share price, that may be as much action as you see from this deal.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

I don't have a view if it will happen or not but surely the question is not just about the UK but about the world? Vodafone has a great cable TV network in Spain, for example, that could share technology and content purchasing with LGI's cable businesses in the UK and Europe.
Does Vodafone's pausing its UK TV business indicate anything on the merger front or not? I think someone here - maybe Stephen - had suggested that it was cancelled at the last minute after extensive testing.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Vodafone UK has nothing to do with any other Vodafone entity around the world. They all operate as different companies, the discussions in the media relate only to the UK Vodafone operation.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

I'm sorry but that simply is not true. VF does actually roll out common overarching strategies and technologies across countries. If what you were suggesting was really happening, I doubt quite a number of my colleagues would be working over at VF now. :)

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

I don't think that's quite true, they do operate as separate companies but are also run as one.

Much in the same way LG is one company but VM, Telenet, ziggo are individual identities.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

What has a common strategy got to do with what the proposed merger is being referred as? This is solely the UK operation and has no bearing upon the other operations around the world :p:

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Nothing, but you made a comment about the way that VF operate which is factually incorrect. VF is much more integrated than you think. The new bits are not yet, but the rest of the organisation does try to operate as a group to achieve synergies and savings.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

The original discussions were about a full-blown merger between the two companies globally. There is nothing in the public domain to indicate that this has changed, but I'm all ears to any insider titbits if you have any!

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Couldn't possibly comment ;)

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Any price rises in the pipeline from VM? with both BT and Sky increasing prices in the coming weeks VM can't be far behind following on from Novembers rise?

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Always.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Virgin Media suspend four workers over delayed roll-out of £3bn ultra-fast broadband

: http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/n...#ixzz4ci3a5iOC

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

I hope this was management positions rather than engineers at the sharp end.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

From other articles I've read, it's definitely management types who have apparently fudged some numbers.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

l suspect other companies are probably up to the same tricks heero.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

releasing homes that don't even have a node built or ducts in the ground hahaha top class.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Well the top man in charge of Lightening has left to "pursue other interests"

Don't know who the four are but should be easy enough to work out.

I'd heard stories that this was going on. Not too surprising really. The Lightening team were/still are under immense pressure to hit the numbers. Seems that some would rather try to fudge it to pacify rather than come clean and disappoint.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Seems problems like that run deep in certain parts of Virgin. I do distinctly remember being on certain teams that were "trailing" certain processes, except the results were planned out ahead of time and nobody wanted to listen to anything different.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Well I know who's gone now.

Aside of that mix-reporting to the SEC is a serious issue, you could quite easily find yourself extradited to US and banged up.

What is does imply is that there is a culture of fear in some parts of the business, fearful of telling the truth that you haven't hit the numbers.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Spending more time with his family. :D

Suddenly un-busy. :rofl:

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

The Times is today talking up an LGI-ITV deal.
Source (subscription)

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Well we shall see Andrew as you do have a penchant for optimism sometimes.:)

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

I'm quite happy with ITV staying independent, I think they do what they do well. But maybe it could give VM leverage to get a certain oceanic channel from Sky?

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Well Virgin so far have been trying for 5 years without success yet.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Not misnamed then. ;)

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Another terrestrial channel in American ownership no thanks :td:

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

l agree MM as history has taught us to be wary but many a time avaricious shareholders can't wait to make a fast buck sadly and thus sell out.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

It's really the system though. The shareholders are largely pension funds and PEPs etc who are tasked with getting the best return for their investors and pensioners. If they decide not to, their funds will suffer and they will be replaced by those who are prepared to make such decisions.
At the moment, it's all informed speculation on The Times's part which has newspapers to sell so it won't be averse to publishing this type of article!

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

I'm well aware of the reasoning and how these things work but my point still stands do we really want all our terrestrial channels being run by Americans ?

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

I was responding to Don's argument that shareholders were avaricious, I was not contradicting any points you had made.
I too would prefer it if ITV was independent. Reports today suggest that LGI is not acquiring any additional shares.
http://www.reuters.com/article/uk-br...-idUKKBN1750ZU

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Perhaps the Liberty/GS loan could be related to Vofafone instead?

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Perhaps not.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

TalkTalk and BT named the worst of all broadband providers

Talktalk scored 38% with BT getting 45%

Sky (48%) and EE (49%)

The best providers

Zen Internet 86% Utility Warehouse (81%), John Lewis Broadband (68%)

Virgin scored (52%) just ahead of Vodafone (50%) and the Post Office (48%)

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/bu...-a7692146.html

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Users are reporting Broadband and TV issues in; London, Nottingham, Bristol, Leeds and Manchester

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

The company denied the issues were nationwide after viewers complained of TV and broadband faults

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news...plain-10411514

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Have VM realised the last price rise late last year was one too many for a lot of customers hence no rise so far this year? for the past few years they were doing 2 increases a year

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Tom Mockridge admitted they got it wrong with the second price rise last year. My guess is September or November.

There's speculation that Sky are changing their Sports bundle and pricing in the Autumn. Usually Sky raise prices in June, but this year they haven't so it could be August or September to coincide with the new football season. There could be a benefit to Virgin of marrying up their price increase to coincide with that so customers have fewer, albeit larger, price rises throughout the year.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Not just VM, Sky and BT are suffering too as consumers become more price conscious.
https://www.ft.com/content/3eba27e2-...6-896b95f30f58
Free access: Google Consumers shun UK telecoms groups over higher prices

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

The tide is turning with inflation now outstripping wage growth.
Maybe it's a good time to launch project Prosecco.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Drone Racing League announced today the close of a Series B investment round of more than $20 million, led by U.K. satellite provider Sky, Liberty Media and Lux Capital.

http://variety.com/2017/digital/news...we-1202462343/

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Will Liberty Global make a bid for ITV?.

http://in.reuters.com/article/us-itv...-idINKBN1AB192

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Another UK terrestrial broadcaster potentially under American ownership.:rolleyes:

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Sadly there ain't much done or owned in Britain anymore MM that is British.:(:td:

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Just rumours again.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Virgin Media mulls ditching 1 in 3 UK facilities.

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/0..._office_space/

---------- Post added at 10:57 ---------- Previous post was at 10:56 ----------

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

No big deal, these are mainly technical sites ( I.e. a Headend ) that may have a some office space too. They're just closing the office bits. If it's a technical site it will still remain as such.

Most of these sites have poor facilities.

It's generally a good thing, but it may inconvenience some.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

An announcement will be made by Virgin Media this week about changes to product offerings and prices.

Hopefully, this will include more 4K content and streaming services.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Will it be a bang or a whimper OB?.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

I dont think we'll have long to wait to find out - this probably coincides with 50mb broadband ending today (according to t&c's on website anyway) and Full House bundle reducing to 100mb tomorrow.

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

Discovery have won the battle for Scripps.

http://www.digitaltveurope.net/72480...-for-us14-6bn/

Re: John Malone/Liberty/VM General News Thread
 

"Cable giant Virgin is once again hiking up the price of its broadband and phone bundles, according to a list of new pricing arrangements seen by The Register.

Under the "player TV bundle" new customers can sign up to a package which includes broadband and 13 TV channels at a discount of £5.50 per per month or £32 for the first year.

But changes coming into force next month mean they will initially pay £33 per month, and then £48 per month thereafter. Meanwhile, the highest end VIP bundle, which includes 97 channels, will jump from the current starting rate of £85 to £90 for the first 12 month, and then increase to £120 afterwards.

This follows a price hike last August, which saw customers hit with an increase of £42 per year for those with a broadband and phone or "big bundle" package, and just under £36 per year for those with broadband only.

The firm's student nine-month contracts are also changing from August. Virgin's entry-level broadband package for students of 50Mbps broadband is up from £26 to £33, with the 100Mbps and 200Mbps both increasing by £3 to £39 and £44 respectively. However, the 300Mbps package is being cut from £51 per month, to £49."

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/0..._prices_again/