FAO UTV: Smaller Energis cuts 60 more jobs

dahamsta

Energis is the company that routes voice and Internet calls to/for UTV. Obviously this event doesn't affect UTV directly since they're a "key corporate" customer, but I'm concerned at how it will play out in the long term. Energis will say that they're simply cutting costs and everything's AOK, but realistically speaking we have to consider all the options. For example, is Energis making cuts to infrastructure investment, and if so how will that impact on UTV's ability to roll out FRIACO-based services in June?

I'd like to hear a comment from UTV on this one please. How are the plans for FRIACO going? On schedule for June?

adam

Smaller Energis cuts 60 more jobs

Thursday April 24th 2003

TELECOMS company Energis, formerly Nevada, has laid off a further 60 people and is reducing its voice telephony offering in the Irish market.

The lay-offs come just four months after the UK company laid off 60 people, and the company is now understood to have a staff of around 50 or 60 in Ireland.

A copy of a letter sent out by Energis to its smaller customers, a copy of which has been obtained by the Irish Independent, says the company is focusing on key corporate and public sector customers here.

"As an existing Energis voice customer, we would like to work with you over the coming weeks to ensure a smooth withdrawal of this service and assist you to arrange an alternative supplier for your telephone calls," the letter says.

The letter suggests the name of an alternative supplier, but points out that unless a new supplier is organised within 42 days, telephone calls will be routed back to Eircom.

The scaling back of the Energis operation in Ireland is a blow to telecoms regulator Etain Doyle in her attempts to boost competition to incumbent Eircom.

Energis Communications (Ireland) is based near Dublin Airport. The UK headquartered telecoms company took over 100pc control of the then Nevada last November when it bought out Belfast-based Viridian's 50pc share in the telecoms group.

Energis and Viridian had moved into telecoms in the Republic in 2000 when they took over Stentor for €46m and renamed it Nevada.

Charlie Weston

Balfa

Wouldn't UTV have their own SLAs with energis? If any changes that energis make affect these SLAs, then UTV could just get another ISP.

Energis also provides the backbone for much bigger ISPs, like freeserve?

We've heard about energis downsizing before. I'm sure it's nothing to be concerned about.

dahamsta

Wouldn't UTV have their own SLAs with energis?

You mean an undertaking to supply? Well, we don't really know if there is one, or if one is being negotiated, or if UTV and Energis have just had a nice chat about it over tea and cake. I would hope that given our Arch Enemy Scott's Taunton's[1] undertakings on this forum that contracts are in the bag, but I have to confess that I'm just an eensy bit concerned that this may not be the case. Hence my post.

If any changes that energis make affect these SLAs, then UTV could just get another ISP.

To another operator, yes, of course they could. The problem being that the only operators capable of taking them on, at least to the best of my knowledge, are EsatBT and Eircom. That kind of changes the ballgame a little, doesn't it?

Energis also provides the backbone for much bigger ISPs, like freeserve?

We're talking about Ireland here though Balfa, and there's nothing stopping Energis pulling out of Ireland tomorrow. Well, it didn't stop Gateway anyway. Or Alcatel. Or...

We've heard about energis downsizing before. I'm sure it's nothing to be concerned about.

I'm afraid I have to disagree, I think that given the lack of competition in our marketplace, it's something to keep in mind at all times. We can't afford to lose operators like Energis, we need them in our marketplace to keep Eircom and EsatBT on their toes, just like we need UTV to keep their ISP's on their toes.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to naysay here, or diss UTV or Energis. I have great respect and admiration for those companies for the simple reason that they're saving me money; and also because Scott and Malcolm had the guts to come on here and talk to us. I just have a bad feeling in my gut, and a few words of encouragement from UTV would help. A wee pat on the ass and a whisper in my ear will send me merrily on my way.

I'll settle for the pat on the ass. They couldn't possibly miss.

adam

[1]You need to say this out loud, in the same tone you'd say "Our Good Friend Mary O'Rourke".

Balfa

Yay. Very informative.

Is it really only Energis, Esat and eircom? I know i heard bad things about worldcom a while ago... are they all gone now? Is there no one else?

What exactly does it take to be a carrier? Do they just have a POP in Dublin or something, that's part of their own network, and runs off to nodes in London, New York, etc?

What's the difference, infrastructurally, between a carrier like energis, and a telephone service provider like swiftcall, vartec, spirit? Or are they completely different ballgames?

Also, what does it take to start your own telecoms company?

dahamsta

Is it really only Energis, Esat and eircom? I know i heard bad things about worldcom a while ago

I actually hadn't thought of Worldcom, but to be honest I don't think they'd have the interconnects for it.

(I'd just like to add at this point that I shortened that one sentence down from two paragraphs with two completely separate (and particularly scathing, even for me) rants about Worldcom. I think Dustaz and sceptre should buy me a pint each for my restraint.)

... are they all gone now? Is there no one else?

Absolutely not, but you have to take scale into account here. Becoming an operator is relatively simple, but becoming a national operator is much more difficult and way, way more expensive, because you need to interconnect into as many primary exchanges as possible. You can get around this by interconnecting at tandem exchanges, but for some reason this isn't even on the table yet in Ireland, even in light of the fact that ST FRIACO (Single Tandem) has become the norm in the UK.

UTVi isn't going to roll out FRIACO area by area, and exchange by exchange because their business model and marketing platform aren't built for it. The core of UTVi's business model is their relationship with UTV's media properties, of which the most important is UTV itself, and when FRIACO comes out you'll see them leveraging that like a good 'un. So it has to be national from the word go or not at all; I think Scott said this right here himself in fact.

They don't want to do it piecemeal either - an operator here and an operator there - because the more operators you deal with, the more negotiations you have to get into, the more contracts you have to develop, and it becomes less and less cost-oriented. This is particularly true because FRIACO is going to have extremely tight margins from the outset. So they need to do the entire thing through as few operators as possible: one for preference, two at a push and three at the outside.

And this is where we run into trouble, because they aren't a hell of a lot of operators that operate at that kind of scale in Ireland. I could count them up on one hand in fact, with an unspecified number of fingers severed at the joint.

What exactly does it take to be a carrier? Do they just have a POP in Dublin or something, that's part of their own network, and runs off to nodes in London, New York, etc?

This is really outside the scope of the thread. Ask in Nets/Comms if you're really interested.

What's the difference, infrastructurally, between a carrier like energis, and a telephone service provider like swiftcall, vartec, spirit? Or are they completely different ballgames?

Again, mostly outside the scope, but to cut it down to bare essentials: Telephone service providers use carriers like Energis to route their calls.

Also, what does it take to start your own telecoms company?

In Ireland? Balls the size of a planet.

adam

antoinolachtnai

Well, if anyone is _really_ interested in getting into the telephone business in Ireland, there's a decent enough opportunity at the moment, if you can come up with a bit of cash. Chorus is up for sale at the moment. Yes, I know, it's a cable company, not a telephone company, but think convergence, integration, interactive TV, wireless, buzzword mania ...

it's got potential, if you had the cash to get in there, were hard-nosed enough to bargain them down to a reasonable price and were, as Adam suggests, sufficiently manly in character.

a.

dahamsta

There's also an absolutely massive opportunity for growth with Chorus now that the regional licences are gone; plus there's the fact that cable is beating DSL in the marketplace hands-down in nine out of ten countries. Obviously the amount of investment required is massive too, but I don't care what anyone says, the problem isn't getting cash, it's putting the team together. With Chorus, that would pretty much mean serious "shape up of ship out" messages to the existing team, and a number of high-profile layoffs to get the message across.

What I wouldn't give to be in charge of that.

adam

DSLinAbsentia

Cable smable fable dahamsta, the cable sector in Ireland is frought with far more politics than mere telco nonsese. I agree, cable is the way - but at 33, I'll be seeing my pension before I see 10Mbps cable access to the net (unless I move out of this gaff to Provence and get Lawrence Lllewellyn Bowen to decorate my high speed modem)

I would also disagree on cash. Cable is massively capital intensive. Most of Dublin's cable infrastructure is ageing. You'd need to replace both the cable, the repeater (uni-directional for bi-directional), probably get caught up in licensing/dig hell to move half of the overground cables to mandated underground setups. It's a MASSIVE amount of dosh. I used to work in the 2nd largest cable operator and between cash 'n' politics I'd rather have the €ircom cheeswire teetering over my nads than Independent Media's thanks very much.#

DSLinAbsentia

One other thing - €ircon is like Ivy - it'll strangle the crap out of everything to gain dominance - this means taking less nutrients (i.e., lower costs) to make sure it gains a foothold - the lesser fauna (netsource, UTVip etc) will have great difficulties. Watch and learn as the government feed the roots of the ivy....

Change this? How? Poison the roots of course... Cancel your terrestrial service - you won't? I probably won't either? Quelle suprise. Apathy, the modern Oirish condition....

Ireland, the GUBO nation (Grease Up, Bend Over)

Fianna Fail, voted in again? - Ireland the BOHICA nation... (Bend Over, It's Coming Again)

Sad but true....

Balfa

actually, eircom are the complete opposite. it's not like their market share has gone UP since deregulation :P

they'll talk all the cash they can in the short term, pissing off any customers with at least half a brain, who will then all move to another telco/isp as soon as they can.

Do you honestly think eircom's been undercutting UTV and increasing their market share in comparison to UTV since UTVip was launched??

crawler

Operators in Ireland :-

Business ( main players - own fibre )

COLT
Worldcom ( now MCI )
Energis
EsatBt
ntl:business
VIA Networks
eircom

Ressie ( main players )

eircom
EsatBT
Switch / switchless resellers - Smart , Cinergi etc etc
UTVip

Adam - the biggest problem facing Cable Co's here is the grade of the cable - and that is cash. The lower grade stuff is just not up to 2-way - also the actual bandwidth available is very limited until all analogue signals are terminated. Mind you once all is digital there are possibilities with some of the newer amp kit.

dahamsta

DSLinAbsentia, crawler, if you actually read people's posts, you might look like less of a moron when you reply saying pretty much what the original poster said. I didn't say that the problem isn't cash - in fact I specifically said that the investment required was enormous - I said that the problem isn't getting cash. Slight different there.

While I'm at it, try doing a search on my handle for this forum. The number of posts returned should indicate that I have a slightly better understanding of the comms and cable marketplace than you give me credit for. If you're too lazy do do that, try dividing my post count on the left by two.

adam

crawler

Jaaass......
Never questioned your knowledge - sorry for taking the wrong meaning from you post.

DSLinAbsentia

Originally posted by dahamsta
DSLinAbsentia, crawler, if you actually read people's posts, you might look like less of a moron when you reply saying pretty much what the original poster said. I didn't say that the problem isn't cash - in fact I specifically said that the investment required was enormous - I said that the problem isn't getting cash. Slight different there.

While I'm at it, try doing a search on my handle for this forum. The number of posts returned should indicate that I have a slightly better understanding of the comms and cable marketplace than you give me credit for. If you're too lazy do do that, try dividing my post count on the left by two.

adam

Didn't question your knowledge either - and there's nothing moderate in your response oh moderator!