Slashdot Mirror
In the UK, T-Mobile and Orange To Merge
EthanV2 sends in BBC coverage of the merger plans of Orange and T-Mobile in the UK. "T-Mobile and Orange plan to merge their UK businesses, creating a mobile phone giant with 28.4 million customers. If completed, a deal between Deutsche Telekom's T-Mobile and Orange owner France Telecom would see a firm with sales of €9.4 B (£7.0 B, $13.4 B). It would be the UK's largest provider, overtaking Telefonica's O2, with about 37% of the mobile market. ... However, it is likely that competition authorities in the UK and EU will probe the deal."
28 million. In a couple of 60 million people that must be close to 50% of the UK cellphone using population. Surely that must be a monopoly.
However, it is likely that competition authorities in the UK and EU will probe the deal.
Is there ever any news of mergers that hit Slashdot that aren't probed by the EU?
I hope this means that Android phones will now be available on Orange.
metageek
I guess Darth Vader finally capitulated and joined the Orange Side?
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In the UK, people annoyed by retardedly phrased Slashdot headlines.
Reports on this vary, according to some this is not a merger (which would attract the attention of the competition people) but an agreement to share infrastructure. Deals of the latter sort have already been approved by the regulators.
could go the other way. it would appear as though the creators are 'upset' with US. no matter (ahha), never mind, we were misinformed..., again. you call this 'weather'? never a better time to adhere to whatever it is that you believe in.
This merger makes me very happy indeed. One of my kids is a lawyer specialising in telecoms competition issues. Recession? What recession?
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Forget the title - What on earth happened to the dollar? It used to have a 1-to-1 parity with the Euro and now it's losing value.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
Did they already extend into Poland?
I paid the bills at my last employer. About six months after MCI was gobbled up by Verizon, the bills went up about 40% (an estimate because I never did the math). US companies could raise their prices and pass the costs on to their custromers and the investors on Wall Street can take their profits home (and afford health insurance). Of course, it just makes us a little less competitive. Our balance of trade gets a little worse as our trading partners can go elsewhere.
My last employer is dropping almost all of it's Verizon accounts. I imagine their response to this will be to buy Global Crossing.
Since somebody is clearly removing all the posts that are actual spam, couldn't they remove ones like this while they're about it?
This can only really be seen as a bad thing for the mobile phone market in the UK.
It's time the monopolies and mergers commission stamped on this one and Ofcom (the telecommunications regulator) finally grew some balls...
This isn't exactly relevant, but the rant about this has been building in my mind for quite some time! :)....
Mobile networks in the UK are a bit of a farce, they're still tied to outdated ideas of tying a handset to a network, and long contracts. (yes, I know, the US (and Canada) are even worse...).
If they really want to encourage competition, force all the networks to share all their base-stations and carry each other's traffic for free (or by compulsory purchasing the network hardware and setting up a management company (a.la railtrack - but hopefully not quite such a chronic cock-up...)) then all they have to compete on is customer-service and benefits... that'll drive things in a positive direction for the consumer, not to mention everyone would have THE best coverage they could have on ANY network :).
Alternatively, my other idea was to make it against the law to offer a contract for longer than 30 days, and to prevent operators from bundling phones with contracts... Also, phones would be required to be supplied unlocked,.
For those people who like to buy their phones in installments (crazy, crazy people), stores could sell phones on a monthly loan scheme, but it would not be allowed to be tied to line-rental and the contract associated with a physical sim-card.
This would provide all the following benefits:
- Make the real costs of network charges a LOT more transparent.
- Would increase Churn (bad for networks, but good for consumers and the market as a whole).
- Would allow anyone to use any device on any network (encouraging churn).
- There would be NO exclusives to any particular network (people could go to the best contract for that device, not stick with a sub-standard data network (not naming any names *cough* O2 *cough*))
- No operator branding (yeuch, every time I see it, it reminds me of someone chavving up a car!)
- More competitive deals (Networks would have to work hard to keep customers in one place)
- Better customer service (or people will go to a network that doesn't employ script-reading drones)
Ah, but well, that won't happen as regulators don't really work for the benefits of the consumer and try to encourage innovation.
Frankly, having been on ALL the networks in the UK at one time or another, they're pretty much as bad as each other... it's more a case of choosing the least-worst!
Just my observations from experience of myself and friends/family:
Orange - Fair Signal, Medium Customer Service, Stingy Data, nasty habit of not offering same deals to upgrading customers. :(
Vodafone - Excellent Signal, Good Customer Service, Medium Data, nasty habit of being an absolute RIP OFF price wise, and 24 month contracts!?!?!
O2 - Poor Signal, Medium Customer Service, Good Data, nasty habit of dropping data connections, seems unable to cope with data traffic but stuck with them due to exclusive phone deals....
T-Mobile - Poor Signal (unless in a major city), Poor Customer Service, Medium/Good Data, let down by signal, phone choice and diabolical customer service.
3 - Not tried yet, but MVNO, can't speak for now, but used to have a bad habit of not giving cheap phones for upgrading customers (whilst still trying to charge the same per month for line-rental).
Virgin - Another MVNO, signal problems as piggy-back T-Mobile's network.
Posted A/C as I can't be bothered to sign up just to post the odd comment... (no offence)
However, it is likely that competition authorities in the UK and EU will probe the deal
Nope, they will probe the anus's of every subscriber for hidden phones and SIM cards. Only then will they be able to report accurate usage statistics of the mobile frequency radio space and also accurate usage of toilet paper for the cleansing of one's own anal hole.
The EU tend to be vicious these days with mobile operators, so I'm not really worried about the monopoly aspect. What I'm pleased about is what this could potentially do to HSPA coverage on our fair Isle. T-Mobile & Huchinson are already in bed till 2031 in a UMTS Network sharing agreement. Add Orange into the mix and Voda (with their handful of 14.4Mbps coverage spots) don't really look too hot...
And who do you want in court? Elderly lawyers who don't understand this newfangled mobile phone stuff, or specialists who have studied the subject, worked with both providers and Government departments, and understand the issues?
Let me reiterate:not only are you nasty, you are clearly totally unqualified to comment on the subject.
You might also like to consider, insofar as you are capable, that perhaps if companies were not so monopolistic and their bosses - who get paid far more than even the richest lawyers - not so greedy, the need for corporate lawyers would rapidly dry up.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."