Liberty Global plc is an American international telecommunications and television company. It was formed in 2005 by the merger of the international arm of Liberty Media and UGC (UnitedGlobalCom). Liberty Global is the largest broadband internet service provider outside the US.
Liberty Global had an annual revenue of $18.3 billion in 2015, with operations in 30 countries and 47,000 employees by 2016. Its cable services pass 55.8 million homes, with 28.6 million customers or 59 million RGUs (video, internet, and voice subscribers). In 2016, Liberty Global was ranked 88th on the Forbes World's Most Innovative Companies list.
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History
Liberty Global Inc. was founded in 2005 when Liberty Media International, Inc. (LMI) and UnitedGlobalCom, Inc. (UGC) merged. LMI and UGC became subsidiaries of Liberty Global. The new entity had operations in 18 countries and networks over approximately 23 million homes, making it one of the largest broadband services companies in the world.
Liberty acquired German company Unitymedia in November 2009 for $5.2 billion. Unitymedia was Liberty's first German acquisition and the largest private-equity exit in Europe in 2009. In 2010, Liberty sold its stake in Jupiter Telecommunications, a Japanese telecommunications-services provider as Liberty shifted its resources back toward Europe.
In January 2013, Liberty Global raised its stake in Belgium-based Telenet from 50.2% to 58%. In June 2013, Liberty Global acquired British cable group Virgin Media for $24 billion in cash and stock. The agreement expanded Liberty into Europe's largest cable market. The acquisition was ranked as one of the 10 largest cable deals of all time. Liberty agreed on October 28 to sell Chellomedia for $1.035 billion except for its Benelux unit to AMC Networks. It was reported that this acquisition would make Liberty Global the largest broadband company in the world.
Liberty Global announced it would be acquiring Dutch cable company Ziggo for EUR10 billion in January 2014. The acquisition was completed in November 2014, when the services of UPC Nederland began to be merged into the new business. Liberty Global and Discovery Communications became joint owners of All3Media in May 2014 in a £500 million joint deal. In July 2014, Liberty Global acquired a 6.4% stake in ITV plc, valued at £481 million. Liberty's stake in the company increased to 9.9% in July 2015.
In November 2015, Liberty Global announced its acquisition of Cable & Wireless Communications. The $5.3 billion deal expanded Liberty Global's presence into the Caribbean & greater Latin America. The acquisition was completed in May 2016. In 2015, Liberty established the stock Liberty Latin American & Caribbean (LiLAC) focusing on Panama and the Caribbean with assets in Chile and Puerto Rico. Liberty Global is also owner of Cable & Wireless Communications' Seychelles business (named Cable and Wireless Seychelles), a vestige of CWC's once expansive portfolio which once included businesses in Macau, Monaco (Monaco Telecom), Jersey, Isle of Man, Guernsey, St. Helena, Ascension Island, Falkland Islands and Diego Garcia (under the brand Sure, sold to Batelco). The company also currently owns a 49% stake in majority state-owned Trinidadian telco, TSTT (which it has been obliged to dispose of) which competes with their wholly owned subsidiary, FLOW Trinidad. Liberty Global and Discovery Communications paid approximately $195 million for a 3.4% stake in Lions Gate Entertainment Group in November 2015. Liberty CEO Mike Fries joined the Lion's Gate board of directors as part of the acquisition. Liberty invested £7.5million in global broadband cable network Technetix in July 2016. In November 2016, Liberty Global's Virgin Media subsidiary released its Netflix and other app-enabled set-top V6 box.
Merger with Vodafone in the Netherlands
In June 2015, Vodafone confirmed talks with Liberty Global focused on potential partnerships, but denied that a full merger was in the works. Liberty Global invested in Guavus, a data analytics company, in September 2015. In February 2016, it was announced that Vodafone and Liberty Global would merge Dutch operations. Liberty's Dutch subsidiary, Ziggo, would work with Vodafone's mobile network. Vodafone paid Liberty EUR1 billion as part of the joint venture valued at EUR3.5 billion. The deal was approved by the European Commission in August 2016. On December 31, 2016, the proposed merger of Liberty Global's and Vodafone Group's Dutch operations was completed, resulting in a joint venture called VodafoneZiggo Group Holding B.V.
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Horizon TV
Horizon TV is Liberty Global's flagship platform with more than 10 million first-generation Horizon TV devices sold.
Liberty Global launched Horizon TV, a box to stream to TVs, in 2012. H2, an upgraded version of the Horizon box, was launched in 2013. The new system included an upgraded remote control with a QWERTY keyboard. A secondary box connects wirelessly to the main device allowing TV, DVR and VoD streaming to multiple rooms in a subscriber's house. Liberty partnered with ActiveVideo in 2013 to include ActiveVideo's CloudTV on the Horizon boxes. Twitter was integrated into Horizon's mobile app library in 2016. The addition allowed live tweets to be overlaid onto the screen of a program being broadcast. Also in 2016, Horizon TV was launched in Austria, making it available in all three German-speaking countries that Liberty Global operates in.
Operations
Liberty Global operates through the following subsidiaries:
Markets
Americas
Part of Liberty Global is separately listed as LiLAC (Liberty Latin America and Caribbean Group), operating in over 20 countries under the consumer brands VTR, FLOW, Liberty, Más Móvil and BTC, as well as having a sub-sea fiber network.
Liberty Global's operations in the Americas consists of Liberty Puerto Rico, a provider of pay TV, Internet, and telephone services in Puerto Rico, and VTR, a Chilean cable provider of television, telephone, mobile and internet services. Through the acquisition of Cable and Wireless Communications, Liberty Global has become the owner of the largest pay-TV and broadband provider in the Caribbean. In addition, the company also owns CWC's operations in the Seychelles named Cable and Wireless Seychelles.
Europe
Liberty Global serves 12 countries in Europe, and is among the largest cable operators in Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania, Ireland, Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, Slovakia, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.
References
External links
- Official website
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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