January 17, 2012
Virgin Media have had to apologise to some customers over sending out emails to some of their customers they shouldn’t have done which was saying that the customers would be receiving 120Mb broadband even though some of the recipients were those on the lower speed broadband packages which wouldn’t be receiving those speeds.
 Last week Virgin Media announced (Virgin Media to double fibre broadband speeds for customers) that they would be doubling the broadband speed that they would be giving to many of their customers and also upgrading those on their headline package from 100Mb to 120Mb broadband speeds.
Virgin were obviously keen to let their customers know about these free broadband speed upgrades they would be receiving but unfortunately the headline 120Mb broadband package upgrade email was sent to more than just the customers who would be eligible for it which prompted Virgin Media to have to send out a second email explaining their error to some customers which they blamed on “gremlins” in their email system!
Ultimately those customers who received the email by mistake shouldn’t have too much to complain about as they will be having their broadband speeds at least doubled. Also, good news for those on the Virgin Media 50Mb package, they will in-fact also be being upgraded to the 120Mb deal which will see a huge 70Mb broadband speed increase for them.
Virgin Media have also signed up Usain Bolt to feature in their latest advertising campaigns about Virgin Medias “Keep-Up” broadband speeds campaign. Virgin regularly top broadband speed test results charts.
***Update***
Just an update as we didn’t make part of this news precise enough and spotted by one of our readers, we didn’t point out that those Virgin Media customers who are on ADSL connections will not see any speed increases. It is only those customers who are on Virgin Media’s own cable network that will receive the broadband speed upgrades.
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January 11, 2012
Virgin Media are to double their broadband speeds for over 4 million customers and those on their current 100Mb deal will see their broadband speeds increased by a further 20Mb.
 The speed upgrade is likely to take around 18 months, starting in February 2012 and be completed by around mid 2013. Customers who are on 10Mb, 20Mb, 30Mb, and 50Mb services will see their broadband speeds at least doubled. Those customers on the 100Mb service will have their speed increased to 120Mb making it the UK’s fastest widely available broadband service (BT are to offer a 300Mb service but only very few people will be able to access it).
Neil Berkett, the Virgin Media Chief Executive, said:
“The internet has become an integral part of our social, work and family lives, so we think our customers are going to love this. As people are increasingly doing more online, and getting connected to the internet with lots of different devices, having a fast, reliable broadband service should not be a luxury. We want to make sure that consumers have access to the best value broadband service and that means a superfast connection.“
David Cameron, the Prime Minister even applauded the news by saying:
“I welcome this announcement from Virgin Media; it will provide a great boost for the economy and change the way many households, consumers and businesses use the internet. Rolling out superfast broadband across the country is a critical part of our plan to upgrade the UK’s infrastructure and build a new and smarter economy.“
The upgrade programme will see those with older out of date modems receiving free upgraded modems that will be future proofed and be able to deal with broadband speeds up to 400Mb. Virgin Media customers do not need to request the upgrade, it will be done free of charge without many customers knowing.
Those on 10Mb broadband will be increased to 20Mb, those on 20Mb and 30Mb will be increased to 60Mb and those on 50Mb will be increased to 100Mb.
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October 27, 2011
Virgin cable broadband service is continuing to grow in popularity according to their latest set of results with most new customers taking broadband with a speed of 30Mb or above.
Virgin have just released their Q3 2011 results and it shows that they have increased their number of cable broadband customers by 24,300 to their fibre optic cable broadband service but have lost 5,200 customers on their standard DSL service. The customers on Virgins DSL service are those who are not in areas covered by Virgin Medias cable network and so will connect via standard copper broadband connections on BT’s network.
They are also seeing far more new customers taking out super fast broadband options, with 54% of new subscribers taking out broadband with speeds of 30Mb or above, this is compared to a year ago where just 28% were taking 20Mb or higher.
Of Virgin Media’s 4,072,900 cable broadband customers, over 26% are now taking 20Mb or higher broadband form them, this equates to over 1 million customers.
We anticipate allot of Virgin broadband customers who have existing deals may only move to faster broadband packages when they are offered free upgrades to do so. Virgin Media already offer a 50Mb broadband and are rolling out a 100Mb broadband service that is due to be completed during 2012 that will be available to 8 million homes.
Virgin will no doubt eventually change their packages and will not offer their 10Mb broadband service but it is likely to be increased, many customers may only then move to a faster broadband connection when they will not have to pay more for it.
Neil Berkett, the Chief Executive of Virgin Media, said:
“Over a quarter of our entire base now subscribe to speeds of 20Mb or higher and a record number of
customers joined us on superfast broadband speeds during the period with. In TV, we have quadrupled the
number of households using our game-changing TiVo service and customer advocacy for this product is
very strong.
We are increasing the value and mix of our customer base as people add or move to higher tier services
and as new joiners increasingly take up higher value products. This, along with subscriber growth, has
increased revenue and we have had further substantial increases in free cash flow and OCF. Our strong
and sustained financial performance allows us to continue to invest in giving our customers more value and
further differentiating our range of market leading products.“
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October 14, 2011
An outage of Virgin Media broadband, TV and home phone services on Monday in parts of Scotland was caused by rats chewing through fibre optic cable according to Virgin Media.
Hundreds of customers in east Scotland were affected as the rats had chewed through the underground cables. Virgin Media engineers managed to fix the problem by Monday evening but the rats came back and chewed through them again on Tuesday afternoon meaning that services went down again.
The engineers once again came out and sorted the problem, with a spokesperson for the company saying:
“We’ve now put additional measures in place to prevent further damage to our cables to avoid further disruption for our customers.”
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August 8, 2011
Virgin Media are to extend their fibre optic cable network to a further 100,000 homes by the end of 2011.
 Virgin currently cover half of the UK with it’s network and so far during 2011 has seen the network expanded to cover a further 73,000 homes in places such as Derry in Northern Ireland and Staines in West London. The current expansion is going to start in Southampton where Virgin Media plan to double it’s current presence in the city.
Virgin are keen to point out that all homes connected to it’s fibre network are by a high-grade coaxial line unlike BT’s which on the whole is done with the existing copper wire which is inferior for the job than the coaxial line Virgin Media use. Virgin Media’s network has currently cost around £13bn in private investment to get to where it is today.
Jon James, Virgin Media’s executive director of broadband, said:
“By extending our unique fibre optic network to parts of the country previously outside our traditional heartland, we’re ensuring more people can experience the compelling advantages that a superfast connection can bring and in doing so, support the Government’s digital ambitions. Today’s increasingly digital lifestyle requires better broadband and we’ve seen a strong response from the communities we expand into who are crying out for quality services. We’re adding thousands of homes to our network every month as our expansion programme continues and we look for opportunities to give more people access to the fastest broadband and best in home entertainment.”
Virgin have also recently completed trials of the world’s fastest cable broadband which achieved broadband speeds of 1.5Gb, this was done using the existing network infrastructure that Virgin Media have in place and showing that they are able to future proof their network for going forward as and when they need to meet future demands.
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March 16, 2011
100Mb broadband is now available to 1 million UK homes via Virgin Media’s cable network.
 Virgin Media are aiming to have the 100Mb broadband speeds available to all of its network by mid 2012 which would then mean that half of UK homes (13 million) would be able to sign up to this superfast broadband speed.
The executive director of broadband at Virgin Media, Jon James said;
“Reaching the one million home milestone1 is a hugely important step in ensuring consumers are able to keep up with the latest developments in this digitally connected world. We had more then 10,000 registrations on the first day we unveiled 100Mb so there is real desire for better broadband and all the wonderful things you can do with a fast connection. When we finish the roll-out of 100Mb across our network, half the country will have access to ultrafast broadband. That’ll be six years ahead of EU targets.”
The 100Mb broadband is available for £35 per month when it is bundled with other virgin Media services or for £45 when bought as a single product.
Virgin are keeping themselves in front in the broadband speed stakes with the new BT Infinity network only going to be offering fibre broadband speeds of up to 40Mb for the majority of place thats will be covered, despite the fact that BT are launching their own 110Mb broadband service for the premises that they connect will full fibre to the home.
The list of places that are currently enabled to receive the 100Mb fibre broadband from Virgin Media are:
- Barrhead, Renfrewshire
- Barry, South Wales
- Bedford, Bedfordshire
- Canniesburn, Scotland
- Cardiff, Wales
- Cheshunt, Hertfordshire
- Colchester, Essex
- Cwmbran, South Wales
- Dunstable, Bedfordshire
- Ely, Cambridgeshire
- Enfield, Greater London
- Epsom, Surrey
- Farnborough, Hampshire
- Gorseinon, Wales
- Grantham, Lincolnshire
- Greenock, Scotland
- Guildford, Surrey
- Hatfield, Hertfordshire
- Heckmondwike, West Yorkshire
- Hinckley, Leicestershire
- Leatherhead, Surrey
- Nailsea, Somerset
- Pentwyn, South Wales
- Port Talbot, South Wales
- Refrew, Renfrewshire
- Rotherham, South Yorkshire
- Sketty, South Wales
- Southport, Merseyside
- St Mellons, South Wales
- Stevenage, Cambridgeshire
- Stockport, Greater Manchester
- Telford, Shropshire
- Treforest, South Wales
- Trowbridge, Wiltshire
- Wardley, Greater Manchester
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February 17, 2011
Virgin Media has over 4 million cable broadband customers making it the second largest ISP behind BT.
 Around 20 % of Virgin Medias customers are receiving broadband speeds of at least 20Mb which in real terms is over 780,000 homes now signed up to either the 20Mb or 50Mb services on offer. The popularity of the higher speed broadband services was showing as 1 in 3 of each new customers signed up for these extra fast fibre broadband speeds available.
Currently on the 50Mb broadband service Virgin Media had 118,000 customers.
The popularity of Virgin medias broadband services grew tremendously in 2010 as overall Virgin added 76,000 new customers which was a huge leap from 2009 where they added 17,600. In the fourth quarter of 2010 Virgin nearly matched 2009′s total for the year by adding 17,100 new customers alone!
Virgin Media customers tend on the whole to take out bundles with the packages, with 63% of subscribers on Triple play services and 11.8% being Quad-play customers.
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February 1, 2011
Virgin Media are increasing the speed of their XL Broadband package by 10Mb up to a speed of 30Mb while dropping the monthly charge plus offering existing 20Mb broadband customers the chance to upgrade for a one off fee.
 From today the Broadband XL package will offer fibre broadband download speeds of up to 30Mb with the expected downloads expected to be at at least 90% of this stated speed. Along with the 50% speed increase from 20Mb the price is also being reduced from £20 per month to £18.50 per month when taken with the Virgin Media home phone service.
Those on the current 20Mb XL Broadband package don’t have to upgrade as Virgin will keep this package running for existing customers but for a one off fee of £30 they can be upgraded to the new improved and cheaper XL Broadband package. The one off fee is to cover the costs of activation and also to upgrade users routers and modems to the new Virgin Media DOCSIS 3.0 Super Hub.
Virgins Executive Director of Broadband, Jon James, said:
“As consumers continually demand more and more from their broadband, the unique power of our next-generation network means that we’re able to turn up the dial to meet their needs. With so many devices connecting to the internet at home these days, our new 30Mb service will give Virgin Media families that extra boost needed to make everything run smoothly, with speeds that don’t slow down depending on where you live.”
Last week Virgin announced that they had topped 4 million households now connected to it’s fibre optic network.
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November 1, 2010
Virgin Media’s 100Mb pre-registration saw more than 10,000 people sign up for the new service ready for when it launches in December.
The pre-registration for the new 100Mb fibre broadband service was opened on Wednesday and in the first 24 hours it is believed that over 10,000 customers signed up proving that there is a huge demand for super fast fibre broadband services.
The new 100Mb broadband service will initially be available to around 200,000 homes when it launches in December, but it is expected that by mid-2012 that all of Virgin Medias fibre optic cable network which covers 12.7 million homes will have access to these super fast speeds.
There was some questions asked if there was enough demand for the super fast broadband when Virgin Media currently only have 90,000 subscribed to the 50Mb broadband package but they said that they believe there is.
Neil Berkett, the Virgin Media Chief Executive told the Guardian newspaper:
“When we think the market is ready we will upgrade the network accordingly and launch products”
“The brilliant thing is with the scale and power of our network we could run 400Mb today. 100,000 lapped up 50Mb in the past 12 months, that gives an indication that the market is ready for 100Mb.”
Virgin clearly want to lead the way with the fastest broadband, so it is little wonder that they are offering this faster broadband speed when their main rival, BT, are currently rolling out their own fibre broadband network across the country.
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October 27, 2010
Hot on the heels of the news we reported yesterday that Virgin Media were to launch their 100Mb broadband this week and today we see that they have indeed announced the roll out of their new flagship broadband speed.
Pre-registration is open from today for those who want to get in the super-fast fibre broadband lane of 100Mb broadband which is double the headline speed that Virgin was offering of 50Mb, it will also offer upload speeds of 10Mb.
It is expected that it will take 18 months for the roll out of their upgrades across their network which they say will cover more than 12.7 million UK homes and offer next generation broadband that is nearly 20 times the current UK average broadband speed. The new service will go on sale in December for the first areas to be upgraded to it and then an extensive roll-out plan will extend the product across the Virgin Media network.
The chief executive of Virgin Media, Neil Berkett, said:
“The launch of our 100Mb service is a significant milestone in the UK’s broadband evolution and a vivid illustration of the power of our next generation network. From establishing the UK’s first ever broadband service in 2000 to the launch of 100Mb in 2010, in the space of just ten years, Virgin Media has led the greatest developments in digital Britain. The world of possibilities that broadband will enable is set to explode and we’re excited about the innovations we can bring to consumers in the next decade.”
The Virgin Media 100Mb broadband will cost £35 when bought with a phone line (£11.99) or £45 if bought as a stand alone service. There will be a £30 activation and £40 installation charge on top of this. It does come with a new “SuperHub” which not only a router that is designed to be power-efficient but is also capable of delivering broadband speeds up to 400Mb. A fair use policy will apply for the unlimited usage on the package.
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