Esat BT confirms interest in NTL bid

Esat BT confirmed that it was considering a bid for NTL Ireland yesterday as it reported a 37 per cent jump in revenues to €96 million during the third quarter.

Mr Bill Murphy, Esat BT chief executive, said the firm would be "daft not to take a look at NTL Ireland" but said it had not made a decision yet on whether to bid.

Esat BT said its EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation) increased 20 per cent to €12 million in the three months to the end of 2004.

But the State's second-biggest fixed-line telecoms operator did not release any additional financial details or indicate when it would turn a profit.

But figures filed recently with the Company's Registration Office in Dublin show that Esat BT reported a loss of €24 million in the year to the end of March 2004.

This was a considerable improvement on the previous year, when it lost €95.8 million.

Accumulated losses at Esat BT are now worth €401.5 million, according to the financial results.

Mr Murphy said Esat BT had enjoyed record growth in the past nine months and he saw no reason why this wouldn't continue in the final fiscal quarter.

He said Esat BT was prepared to invest more than €120 million in the Irish market over the next three years to boost its business.

But he said he had grave concerns about whether a Government target of signing up 500,000 people to broadband connections by 2007 would be achievable.

He said there would need to be a shake-up of Eircom's wholesale business and the environment for "local loop unbundling" - the process of opening the last mile of its network to competition.

"I have grave concerns that we are not accelerating on broadband," he added. "This company is unable to innovate due to the intransigence of Eircom."

He said that Eircom was refusing to automate the processes required to enable firms to open up Eircom's network for use by rivals and was preventing regulation from working through appeals.

"My worry is that Eircom first of all fought the introduction of flat-rate internet, it then fought the introduction of broadband and they are now fighting unbundling," added Mr Murphy, who said just 2,500 phone lines had been unbundled over three years.

Asked if Esat BT was preparing a bid for NTL Ireland, Mr Murphy confirmed it was looking at the cable company. But he said the firm had not taken a final decision on the issue.

He said he had been in charge of cable networks previously owned by British Telecom and had also disposed of these assets.

Mr Murphy said there was no question that the issues of convergence and home entertainment services in internet protocol networks were coming more to the fore.

British Telecom is already conducting trials on providing television and video services via broadband networks.

It is also about to trial fixed and mobile phone integrated services in Northern Ireland shortly, added Mr Murphy, who said Esat BT would also like to be able to offer its customers mobile services.