US Cable Giant Liberty Global buys Virgin Media

[MovedGoalPosts]

Debate the issues. Do not debate the forum members making the posts.

Originally Posted by Qtx

That is the difference now. VM got their foot in customers doors when there were no other fibre broadband options. Now that has changed with many providers able to offer fibre. Most of the alternative fibre providers sell broadband connections that have almost double the upload speed of virgins top product and with cloud based consumerism getting larger, upload speeds are going to be very important.

So customer numbers from the past may have no bearing on the future. All the data pointed towards virgin being the loser in the next few years, so Liberty Global are either brave or stupid

If "all the data" points that way, one would wonder why Liberty Global have made a £15 billion bid - could it be their extensive teams of industry analysts might have a different view?

[Pierre]

Originally Posted by Qtx

So customer numbers from the past may have no bearing on the future. All the data pointed towards virgin being the loser in the next few years, so Liberty Global are either brave or stupid

The idiots, if only they had you advising them.

[Sirius]

Originally Posted by Pierre

The idiots, if only they had you advising them.

[Itshim]

So to sum this recent "debate" up Liberty are a two bit, johnny come lately company. That do not understand the cable business what so ever. Clearly are throwing money down the pan. And are run by a bunch of fools.
In conclusion They really need to study the informed comments made by some of the well informed posters on this site

[Qtx]

The usual suspects attacking the poster like a pack of starving rabid dogs and the best they can do is some un-funny sarcasm? Boring!

If all the virgin staff are happy and 'buzzing' about this buyout as some staff have said in this thread, one can take from that they knew virgins future was heading towards a ditch so the Liberty Global cash injection was needed.

Companies sometimes buy others for less obvious and nefarious reasons. No one here knows the real reasons for the purchase. The TV side is obvious but the broadband magnet it had before is going to be in decline and its technological limits making it less competitive in the future. So one would hope Liberty are not just moving cash around or using the Virgin buyout for other reasons..

[denphone]

Excuse me Sir but Virgin Media were perfectly safe before any takeover and they are perfectly safe with a takeover so yet again your wild claims are unsubstantiated yet again l am afraid.

[Qtx]

Originally Posted by denphone

Excuse me Sir but Virgin Media were perfectly safe before any takeover

That is a wild and unsubstantiated claim from someone with no inside knowledge. Making an opinion sound like fact does not make it fact, even if you have a strange infatuated blind love for the company you are making the claims about.

[BenMcr]

Originally Posted by Qtx

one can take from that they knew virgins future was heading towards a ditch so the Liberty Global cash injection was needed.

Originally Posted by Qtx

Making an opinion sound like fact does not make it fact, even if you have a strange infatuated blind love for the company you are making the claims about.

Pot, Kettle?

Originally Posted by denphone

Excuse me Sir but Virgin Media were perfectly safe before any takeover and they are perfectly safe with a takeover so yet again your wild claims are unsubstantiated yet again l am afraid.

I was going to reply but really can't be bothered with his views any more. He clearly didn't see the q4 results and reckons he knows better than Liberty who have been in this business for years. Think he also said something about posting numbers to get stupid shareholders to buy more shares?

Looks like they wern't stupid after all looking at what they the price they are being bought for.

[Stephen]

Liberty purchased VM as they are a large cable company doing very well and in a country that they don't have any service in. So now they do and it will boost their portfolio majorly.

Thats the short and straight forward answer.

[Pierre]

Originally Posted by Stephen

Liberty purchased VM as they are a large cable company doing very well and in a country that they don't have any service in. So now they do and it will boost their portfolio majorly.

Thats the short and straight forward answer.

and in addition.

they have similar business models, and there may be synergies in procurement, and other areas, were they may be able to save some money.

Being the largest cable company in Europe, certainly helps your buying power.

[Qtx]

It does indeed help their portfolio but the statement that virgin was doing very well is more than questionable.

The last quarter saw an extremely aggressive retentions department trying to stop customers leaving as if their life depended on it. There are numerous reports of this and lies being told simply to stop customers from leaving. Experienced this first hand too and the lies virgin staff told was shocking. That same last quarter virgin moved the "Thinking of leaving us" option from their phone system and hid it away under "Thinking of moving house". That option had been in their menu system in the same place for years but hiding it away under an option you would not necessarily choose if you just wanted to terminate your connection was in my opinion desperation toi stop more customers leaving.

So tactics like that to make a quarters results look a certain way but the underlying problems are there still. Like the limitations of virgins broadband technology. Even talktalk offers a faster upload speed than virgin and I don't see virgin competing in a cloud environment future due to this. Already they are losing ground here and adding on more traffic management will push customers over to fibre alternatives like BT and Sky which have no traffic management or limits/thresholds or whatever.

The bottom line is taking quarter results as a sign that a company will do well in the future is just plain silly. You have to look at the whole picture. Look at how virgin have been broke and not able to invest in their network properly, look at how they have worded quarterly statements differently between quarters to hide worse figures, look at how the landscape is changing and where virgins weaknesses are.

Virgin were doing average at best. Without being brought out recently, I would have predicted them out of the game in around 2 years.

Even the biggest companies go out of business and up until that point they are trying to convince the world they are ok and doing well

[Pierre]

Originally Posted by Qtx

It does indeed help their portfolio but the statement that virgin was doing very well is more than questionable.

The last quarter saw an extremely aggressive retentions department trying to stop customers leaving as if their life depended on it. There are numerous reports of this and lies being told simply to stop customers from leaving

if there are numerous reports then let's have few links?

Experienced this first hand too and the lies virgin staff told was shocking.

like what?

That same last quarter virgin moved the "Thinking of leaving us" option from their phone system and hid it away under "Thinking of moving house". That option had been in their menu system in the same place for years but hiding it away under an option you would not necessarily choose if you just wanted to terminate your connection was in my opinion desperation toi stop more customers leaving.

Have you ever tried to doowngrade your sky package?

Go onto their website and try and find where says how to do it?

Good luck.

So tactics like that to make a quarters results look a certain way but the underlying problems are there still. Like the limitations of virgins broadband technology

What technological limitations would they be?

The bottom line is taking quarter results as a sign that a company will do well in the future is just plain silly. You have to look at the whole picture. Look at how virgin have been broke and not able to invest in their network properly, look at how they have worded quarterly statements differently between quarters to hide worse figures, look at how the landscape is changing and where virgins weaknesses are.

That's just it, you don't take a quarters results you take 6 years of results.

Increasing revenues
Decreasing debt
Increasing share price

Virgin were doing average at best. Without being brought out recently, I would have predicted them out of the game in around 2 years.

That is so laughable, that I'm still laughing, and will probably continue laughing for most of the day.

[BenMcr]

Originally Posted by Qtx

The last quarter saw an extremely aggressive retentions department trying to stop customers leaving as if their life depended on it. There are numerous reports of this and lies being told simply to stop customers from leaving. Experienced this first hand too and the lies virgin staff told was shocking. That same last quarter virgin moved the "Thinking of leaving us" option from their phone system and hid it away under "Thinking of moving house". That option had been in their menu system in the same place for years but hiding it away under an option you would not necessarily choose if you just wanted to terminate your connection was in my opinion desperation toi stop more customers leaving.

You are doing the very thing you've just had a go a denphone for apparently doing.

1) The ARPU per customer went up last quarter (again). If the retentions department were as agressive as you say then I'd expect the ARPU to have gone down.

2) The 'Thinking of leaving us' option was made less obvious due to the fact that the majority of people using that option didn't want to leave - but because of advice given on the internet (including on this site), people were using it as a customer service department - even when there were quicker and easier options available.