National Toll Roads (NTR) is close to completing the sale of its subsidiary Irish Broadband, reports the Irish Independent. In September 2006 NTR slapped a EUR60 million (USD96 million) price tag on the operator after describing it as ‘non-core’, but the newspaper states that the business will now be sold at a ‘substantial discount’. Imagine Telecom is said to be the most likely buyer, but Digiweb could also be interested. Imagine, which also operates Gaelic Telecom, entered the broadband market in 2005. Last year it posted 40% revenue growth year-on-year to EUR55 million and became profitable. Imagine said it has 7,500 business customers, 30,000 broadband customers, and more than 60,000 domestic landline customers. According to TeleGeography’s GlobalComms database, Irish Broadband claimed approximately 55,000 high speed internet subscribers at the end of 2007, giving it a 7% share of the country’s retail broadband market.
For more information on TeleGeography’s GlobalComms databse, visit:
http://www.telegeography.com/products/global_comms/index.php