UPC sees customer base jump 8% to 742,400

UPC saw its Irish customer base jump 8% to 742,400 in the second quarter compared with a year earlier.

UPC, which is the European division of Liberty Global, also said its broadband customer base in Ireland increased 40% to 170,000 in the quarter, compared with a year earlier.

It has 78,000 phone customers in Ireland and its digital subscriber numbers increased 12% year-on-year to over 366,000 in the quarter.

CEO of UPC Ireland, Robert Dunn said: “This quarter has been an excellent quarter for growth across all products. During the same quarter we successfully rebranded to UPC and commenced a new marketing campaign with Craig Doyle as our new brand ambassador, repositioning our company around delivering on three themes trust, value and excitement.

“Our ambitious investment building a state of the art fibre power network will continue to boost the consumer-experience, delivering ever more reliable, faster, better and exciting products.”

Mr Dunn said the imminent launch of UPC’s 100Mb service has generated “huge interest”.

“Digital television growth continues with over 366,000 customers enjoying UPC’s digital offerings. Year-on-year digital subscriber numbers increased by 12%, which was helped by increasing our product proposition and inclusion of ESPN, HD content,” he said.

On a group level. Liberty Global said its second-quarter loss widened from a year ago even as revenues rose 20%, hit by foreign currency transaction losses, increased interest and income tax expense.

Loss from continuing operations widened to $656.3 million (€499m) from a loss of $57.3 million last year.

Revenue increased 20% to $2.17 billion from $1.81 billion the previous year. The company said that excluding the impact of foreign currency movements, the increase in revenue was due largely to the acquisition of Unitymedia and to a lesser extent on organic growth.