Broadband and IPTV plans scaled back by Orange UK

The rollout of fixed-line broadband in Britain for Orange UK, the mobile operator is to be slowed down as it struggles with Europe’s most competitive market forcing it to return its plans for Internet-based TV to the drawing board.

Reporters were recently told by the chief executive of France Telecom owned Orange UK, Tom Alexander that rather than looking just for business growth it would be focusing its efforts on quality of service improvements and because of this it will be scaling the rollout of its broadband back.

Also, to allow for Orange Broadband to gain improved profits and to allow for more control it will be building its own broadband network out instead of renting BT’s existing lines.
Hundreds of complaints had previously been received from broadband customers who were unhappy with their service according to the head of Orange’s global mobile operations, Olaf Swantee, but after a change of focus this was recently seen to have improved.

Ranking in sixth place in the UK behind BT, Virgin Media, Carphone, Tiscali and BSkyB, Orange currently has a fixed-line broadband customer base of just above 1 million.
Speaking recently Mr Alexander said that the group weren’t happy with its plans for the launching of its Internet protocol television and would be reviewing them.

Following its success in France, Orange had run the TV service trial in the UK and its roll out was ready said Alexander. It was, however, decided that the service and how it should work would need to be reconsidered due to its similarity to a TV Product offered by BT called BT vision.

At a briefing in Central London Alexander said “No roll-out imminent,” and also added that various different business models would be looked into. TV on mobile could be one of the new business models that could be included.