Broadband ISP Group TalkTalk Starts Talk Talking to Potential UK Bidders
A new report has this afternoon claimed that the debt strained TalkTalk Group, which last year reportedly appointed advisers PJT Partners to help sell off its remaining operations (here), have now allegedly begun talks with several prospective bidders for their various divisions.
The group has certainly had an eventful few years, which was headlined by the demerger of their businesses (Talk Talk Consumer, PXC [Wholesale] and Talk Talk Business Direct) and last year’s signing of a crucial £400m refinancing package, which enabled them to avoid a default on their debts until 2027 (here, here). This was later followed up by a £120m funding deal to help tackle ongoing financial pressures (here).
More recently they’ve also launched a major brand refresh and advertising push for their consumer broadband ISP business (here). At the same time the group is still doing everything it can to cut costs and tackle their underlying debt problem, including the possible disposal (sale) of its remaining businesses and more job cuts (here).
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According to Sky News, the embattled group has now moved to the next phase by allegedly opening tentative discussions with potential buyers for their various divisions. The talks are expected to attract interest from a number of suitors, such as Vodafone and Virgin Media (O2), although it’s too early to know if anybody will place a serious bid.
At present, the likes of Vodafone and Sky Broadband are probably better fits for TalkTalk’s consumer base than BT or Virgin Media, partly due to their packages, pricing and network selection being more closely aligned; at least in some respects. But a deal with BT can probably be ruled out due to competition concerns.
In addition, it’s unclear whether Vodafone would be willing to take on the added complications of a retail consolidation, while also still being busy with their Three UK mobile merger. TalkTalk declined to comment on the Sky News report. Credits to forum member Ionide for pointing us to this development.
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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Could this be the beginning of the end for TalkTalk? – or just another false dawn. Always thought the Plusnet side of BT would be a good fit, but with competition regulation, and no Digital Voice in their contracts, might just rule them out.
Yeah, also TalkTalk operate over CityFibre (and maybe other altnets?) in addition to Openreach. I can’t see BT stomaching that.
Do TalkTalk have anything that’s worth acquiring and taking a £450m annual loss for? A price sensitive customer base and a load of ancient LLU kit to maintain? Why would you bother?
Hardly the beginning its been going for a few years, selling of customer churn / trend etc. Will be a sad loss for all the original greats Freedom2Surf, Pipex etc.
Sad for many of the workers, but a reflection on its leadership& management, odd how the top never suffer as much.
I hope that TalkTalk does get sold to someone who actually cares about the service the provide.
Someone that provides a Customer Service and Technical Support that knows what there doing rather than reading off a script and only going by what the system says rather than using their brain and some common sense. But i suppose what do we expect for foreign call centres with staff that are not trained to actively listen to customers.
TalkTalk has gone down hill, especially the past 5 years and its no wonder the are hemorrhaging customers left right and centre.
TalkTalk latest DSL hub model from 2018 doesn’t have WPA3. I previously had the d link super router model which was so old but TalkTalk refused to upgrade because it still works. I had to go though complaints to still the get a newer but already nearly outdated router.
I think TalkTalk is just crap now, slowly dying away…
To be honest I think they would better selling their customer base over to another company then just closing the company down. no company would want to have to take on their LLU equipment that is past it’s sell by. I think the solution to this would be sell their customers to Sky or Vodafone as it would mean there would be no issues as they both use City fibre and Openreach.
Some of us were with Post Office,(still using their router!) Shell, Octopus etc.are we to change again? Speed is sometimes almost 10 mbs! Too terrified to change, it might be worse.
Octopus never did Internet.
@Simon – they did. They brought Shell Energy which had a broadband division, and then sold it to TalkTalk pretty much as soon as their purchase of Shell went through.
Surely VM wouldn’t buy them, they’re already in enough debt, I seriously doubt they’d be able to cover their own debts + o2 debt + + UPP! & then TT debts.
I would say VMO2 are the least likely to buy them. Sky or Vodafone would be the most likely suitors.
Anybody who buys the company in its current state is nothing short of daft. Much better to wait for the administrators to come in and cherry pick the prize assets in the resulting fire sale.
So, it’ll be sky then. There’s no competitiveness with sky anymore. They don’t care. It’s the only way they’ll grow their customer base these days.
I was with Talk Talk for 21 years having previously been with BT.Talk Talk initially was a disrupter as their price plans were a lot cheaper than the competition and that’s what attracted me to TT.In those 21 years I have had very few issues and their customer service in my experience was good.
However in the last few years,most of the other broadband providers have become fiecely more competitive offering better price plans and speeds resulting in many customers leaving TT in their droves.
I was told by email I was being transferred to Utility Warehouse with the option to end my contract with no penalties.
I am now with Vodafone.
I think eventually part of TT will be sold off to UW.
The importance of each division to each other is a big consideration.
If the consumer division is sold to another major ISP, it makes sense for them to migrate those customers onto their infrastructure like for like within the WLR stop sell and FTTP Priority Exchange rules, or upgrades elsewhere. Why would a buyer keep the customers on the TalkTalk network as it exists today if they already own one?
The business division will have more complex solutions but overhead cost savings should be possible in the short term with another similar business focussed buyer, with a slower migration to their preferred network plus cross sell / upsell opportunities.
This leaves PXC. The wholesale broadband business is underpinned by the consumer and business divisions so has a big risk. And Ethernet is well replicated UK wide by BT Wholesale, Sky, Vodafone plus others who have their own kit in many exchanges like Zen, Neos etc.
The TalkTalk plan from @2019 make various alt-nets available via them has been slow to market and has been superseded by Zen or the many other direct deals Sky and others have done with the likes of CityFibre. This was an admirable idea but poorly executed. These customers could be hived off separately if needed.
It feels like the market could lose the TalkTalk network without too much trouble as it’s neither groundbreaking or unique in a post LLU world?
Could be interesting for Openreach as their Exchange Exit programme requires each supplier with infrastructure to leave all but 1,000 exchanges in the next decade, and TalkTalk are in most of these!
I’ve been a TalkTalk customer for over 15 years and have had no problems at all. In my area, they use the Openreach network, so it doesn’t really matter who the broadband provider is—the quality is the same.
The quality can be very different between ISPs, though I gather the TT network is actually very good.
Openreach only handle the bit between you and your local exchange. Everything else is dependent on your ISP, and whoever they use as their supplier (if not doing it themselves).
e.g. Vodafone are often criticised for poorer performance than some of their Openreach competitors, because of the way they run their network and how you can be routed anywhere in the country. Moving to another Openreach provider can instantly improve things.