The Company
eircom
eircom is the principal provider of fixed-line telecommunications services in Ireland with approximately 2.6 million fixed-line telephone access channels in service. Our mobile division, Meteor, which was acquired on November 23, 2005, is the third largest mobile operator in Ireland. As at June 30, 2008, Meteor had approximately 983,000 mobile subscribers. Further details of Meteor are available on their website www.meteor.ie. We had turnover of approximately €2 billion and EBITDA* of €698 million in the financial year ended June 30, 2008.
Fixed line services
According to quarterly data published by ComReg, we had a 68% market share of the Irish fixed-line market in the quarter ended June 30, 2008, based on turnover. We have the most extensive fixed-line telecommunications network in Ireland in terms of both capacity and geographic reach, and our competitors rely heavily on our infrastructure. As of June 30, 2008, we had approximately 2.6 million fixed-line access channels in service, of which approximately 1.6 million were PSTN lines and approximately 0.4 million were ISDN channels. As of June 30, 2008, approximately 593,000 PSTN lines, which were enabled for simultaneous support of PSTN and ADSL bitstream, permitting simultaneous, high-speed transmission of voice and data over our network, had been taken up by retail and wholesale customers. We are also the leading internet service provider in Ireland with approximately 611,000 customers, of which 423,000 were broadband customers, as of June 30, 2008.
We offer residential and business customers a wide range of retail services and products, including:
- fixed-line voice services , including PSTN and ISDN access; local, national and international voice services; advanced voice services; and Voice over IP (‘‘VoIP'') services;
- fixed-line data services , including domestic and international data transmission services, such as ADSL; leased lines and advanced data packet based services, including Asynchronous Transfer Mode (‘‘ATM''), frame relay and internet protocol (‘‘IP'') services; managed data networking services; hosting and internet access and related information technology services; and
- other services , including customer premises equipment sales; public payphones; sale and monitoring of domestic alarm systems and directory enquiries. We also offer other authorised operators (‘‘OAOs'') wholesale services and products, including:
- interconnect services; leased lines; partial private circuits; access to our local connection network via unbundled local loops; and ADSL Bitstream access, which supports broadband access;
- · carrier pre-selection, which permits customers to select another OAO as the default carrier for some or all calls, and enhancements to carrier pre-selection, including carrier pre-selection single billing through Wholesale Line Rental (‘‘WLR''), carrier pre-selection agency re-billing and carrier pre-selection single billing through WLR ancillary services, which enable OAOs to provide a fuller range of services;
- · geographic and non-geographic number portability, which allows customers to keep their telephone numbers regardless of the authorised operator they choose; and
- · Flat Rate Internet Access Call Origination (‘‘FRIACO''), allowing OAOs to offer bundled or unmetered internet access.
Mobile services (Meteor)
Meteor is the third largest mobile operator in Ireland in terms of subscribers. As at June 30, 2008, Meteor had approximately 983,000 mobile subscribers, a subscriber base which has increased by approximately 93% since we acquired Meteor in November 2005. Meteor had a share of approximately 19% of the Irish mobile market, based on number of subscribers, as at June 30, 2008. This compares with approximately 18%, based on number of subscribers, as at June 30, 2007.
Meteor was incorporated on March 26, 1998. In June 1998, Meteor tendered in a competitive process to become Ireland's third mobile phone operator. Meteor was awarded its global system for mobile communications (‘‘GSM'') licence in June 2000, and it launched GSM services in February 2001. General Packet Radio Service (‘‘GPRS'') services were commercially launched in October 2003. Meteor was acquired by eircom in November 2005. The fourth 3G licence in Ireland was granted to eircom on 12 March 2007. and on 27 June 2008 it was assigned to Meteor.