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Virgin Media UK Offers Free Kids TV Channels Over Half Term

Monday, Feb 7th, 2022 (11:12 am) - Score 952

Broadband ISP Virgin Media UK (VMO2) has today announced that it will make the operator’s full range of premium kids entertainment and learning-based programmes – a total of 12 kids pay TV channels (e.g. Cartoon Network, Nickelodeon) – available for all TV customers until 8th March 2022, “at no extra cost.”

The full channel list includes: Cartoon Network, Cartoon Network +1, Cartoonito, Nickelodeon, Nick +1, Nickelodeon HD, Nick Junior, Nick Jr Too, Nicktoons, Boomerang, Boomerang +1 and Cartoon Network HD.

David Bouchier, VMO2’s Chief TV & Entertainment Officer, said: “For half term, and right up until 9 March, we are giving all of our Virgin TV customers access to our full range of kids’ programmes at no extra cost, all delivered by our hyperfast network.”

By Mark Jackson
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook, BlueSky, Threads.net and Linkedin.

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Mobile giant Vodafone UK and Sky (Comcast) have reportedly two among several "groups" that have approached budget conscious fixed broadband ISP TalkTalk about a potential deal (most likely an acquisition), which in theory could create a much larger provider with more influence over the industry. Just to recap. In 2020 TalkTalk became the subject of a £1.1bn takeover by Toscafund - controlled by hedge fund tycoon Martin Hughes (here), which including debt valued the broadband provider at around £1.8bn. The deal took the ISP private and gave them more financial flexibility for their future plans. Since then, they've backed Freedom Fibre (here) and this week made the notable acquisition of Ethernet provider Virtual1 (here). According to the FT (paywall) and Sky News, TalkTalk is now said to have asked investment bank Lazard to review its options after allegedly being approach by several groups, including Vodafone and Sky (Sky Broadband). Lazard is a logical choice as they recently acted as Financial Advisor to TalkTalk on the Virtual1 transaction. Some industry analysts have reportedly suggested that TalkTalk itself could now be worth "at least" £3bn. But this seems rather optimistic for an ISP that doesn't have any significant fixed line broadband infrastructure to call its own (excluding their old unbundled LLU network) and largely just piggybacks off Openreach (BT), CityFibre and Freedom Fibre. But TalkTalk do have a strong business and wholesale side. Funnily enough, Sky Broadband are in a similar position with their own fixed line base, while Vodafone also likes to piggyback off Openreach and CityFibre. At present, Vodafone has a fixed broadband base of 991,000 customers, while Sky Broadband is estimated to be home to around 6.7 million and TalkTalk has approximately 4.2 million. Suffice to say, anybody gobbling up TalkTalk would instantly become a much larger provider, giving them a greater say in how the UK broadband market develops and more opportunities for convergence (Vodafone with mobile, and Sky with mobile and TV). Crucially, TalkTalk's consumer base is mostly made up of those on older copper and hybrid fibre lines (i.e. ADSL and FTTC / VDSL2), which are ripe for a future migration to FTTP. At the time of writing, all of the aforementioned operators have decline to comment on the reports, and TalkTalk has yet to receive any serious formal offers. In other words, we strongly suspect that this is largely just an exercise in spin to help TalkTalk drum up some more productive interest in the idea. But at the same time, it's not unreasonable to suspect that they might succeed, as the interest seems genuine. On the other hand, we see reports like this every year or so and only a very few ever convert into a serious offer. Time will tell. Much may depend upon whether or not TalkTalk’s new owners are more flexible and pragmatic about doing a deal than the previous lot. Arguably, TalkTalk might have gone much further by now had they taken some different decisions a few years ago (e.g. co-investing in FTTP instead of Pay TV).

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Cheapest Big ISPs for 100Mbps+:

Community Fibre £21.00

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Vodafone £23.00

150Mbps (27 - 150Mbps up)

Virgin Media £23.50

132Mbps (20Mbps up)

Plusnet £25.99

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NOW £26.00

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Sky £27.00

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Comments

2 Responses

Thomas says:

February 9, 2022 at 1:32 am

@Mark Sky also doing the same thing….
1. Mark Jackson says:
  
  February 9, 2022 at 6:38 am
  
  Can’t see an announcement about that. Can you direct me to it?