Liberty Global plc is a British-Dutch-American
multinational telecommunication
Telecommunication is the transmission of information by various types of technologies over wire, radio, optical, or other electromagnetic systems. It has its origin in the desire of humans for communication over a distance greater than that fe ...
s company with headquarters in
London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
,
Amsterdam
Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the capital and most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population of 907,976 within the city proper, 1,558,755 in the urban ar ...
and
Denver
Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...
. Its respective legal names are Liberty Global
Plc, Liberty Global
B.V. and Liberty Global,
Inc., with the first of these being publicly traded. It was formed in 2005 by the merger of the international arm of
Liberty Media (in turn, a
spin-off of American
cable-television group
TCI) and
UnitedGlobalCom (UGC).
Liberty Global had an annual revenue of $11.5 billion in 2019, with operations in six countries and 20,600 employees. It has 10.8 million cable service subscribers, or 25.3 million revenue generation units (RGU), combining video, internet, and voice customers.
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. UGC founder was Gene Schneider. UGC was also built on acquisitions. United International Holding, later called UGC, acquired in 1995 50% of
UPC from Dutch electronic concern
Philips
Koninklijke Philips N.V. (), commonly shortened to Philips, is a Dutch multinational conglomerate corporation that was founded in Eindhoven in 1891. Since 1997, it has been mostly headquartered in Amsterdam, though the Benelux headquarters i ...
and 100% 1997.
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. In 2010, Liberty sold its stake in Jupiter Telecommunications, a Japanese telecommunications-services provider.
In January 2013, Liberty Global raised its stake in Belgium-based
Telenet
Telenet was an American commercial packet-switched network which went into service in 1975. It was the first FCC-licensed public data network in the United States. Various commercial and government interests paid monthly fees for dedicated lines ...
from 50.2% to 58%.
[ In June 2013, Liberty Global acquired British cable group ]Virgin Media
Virgin Media is a British telecommunications company which provides telephone, television and internet services in the United Kingdom. Its headquarters are at Green Park in Reading, England. It is owned by Virgin Media O2, a 50:50 joint ventu ...
for $24 billion in cash and stock. The acquisition was noted by ''The New York Times'' as one of the 10 largest cable deals of all time. It was reported that this acquisition would make Liberty Global the largest broadband company in the world. Liberty agreed in October 2013 to sell Chellomedia for $1.035 billion except for its Benelux
The Benelux Union ( nl, Benelux Unie; french: Union Benelux; lb, Benelux-Unioun), also known as simply Benelux, is a politico- economic union and formal international intergovernmental cooperation of three neighboring states in western Europe: ...
unit to AMC Networks
AMC Networks Inc. is an American entertainment company headquartered in 11 Penn Plaza, New York.
AMC Networks owns and operates the eponymous cable channel and its siblings, IFC, We TV, and Sundance TV; the art house movie theater IFC Cen ...
.[Tartaglione, Nancy. (October 28, 2013]
AMC Networks To Pay $1B For Liberty Global's Chellomedia
Deadline.com. Accessed on October 28, 2013.
Liberty Global announced it would be acquiring Dutch cable company Ziggo
Ziggo Holding B.V. () is the largest cable operator in the Netherlands, providing digital cable television, Internet, and telephone service to both residential and commercial customers.
History
The company is the result of the merger between ...
for €10 billion in January 2014. The acquisition was completed in November 2014, when the services of UPC Nederland
UPC Nederland ( en, UPC Netherlands) was the second largest cable operator in the Netherlands, providing cable television (digital and analogue), broadband Internet, and telephone service to both residential and commercial customers.
In early 2015 ...
began to be merged into the new business. Liberty Global and Discovery Communications
Discovery, Inc. was an American multinational mass media factual television conglomerate based in New York City. Established in 1985, the company operated a group of factual and lifestyle television brands, such as the namesake Discovery Chan ...
(prior to its 2022 merger with WarnerMedia
Warner Media, LLC ( traded as WarnerMedia) was an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate. It was headquartered at the 30 Hudson Yards complex in New York City, United States.
It was originally established in 1972 by ...
to form Warner Bros. Discovery
Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc. (WBD) is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at 230 Park Avenue South in New York City. It was formed after the spin-off of WarnerMedia by AT&T, and its merger with Di ...
) became joint owners of All3Media
All3Media Limited is a British worldwide independent television, film and digital production and distribution company based in London, England. The All3Media group comprises more than 40 production and distribution companies from across the U ...
in May 2014 in a £500 million joint deal. In July 2014, Liberty Global acquired a 6.4% stake in ITV plc
ITV plc is a British media company that holds 13 of the 15 regional television licences that make up the ITV network (Channel 3), the oldest and largest commercial terrestrial television network in the United Kingdom.
ITV plc is listed on the ...
, 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
Cable & Wireless Communications Ltd operating as C&W Communications is a telecommunications company which has operations in the Caribbean and Central America. It is owned by Liberty Latin America and is headquartered in Denver, Colorado.
It ...
. 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. The company also owned a 49% stake in majority state-owned Trinidadian telco, TSTT, which it was eventually obliged to dispose of as the company itself competes with Liberty's wholly owned Trinidadian 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 £7.5 million in global broadband cable network Technetix in July 2016. In November 2016, Liberty Global's Virgin Media subsidiary released its ]Netflix
Netflix, Inc. is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service and production company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it offers a fi ...
and other app-enabled set-top V6 box. Liberty Global was also ranked 88th on the ''Forbes
''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine owned by Integrated Whale Media Investments and the Forbes family. Published eight times a year, it features articles on finance, industry, investing, and marketing topics. ''Forbes'' also r ...
'' "World's Most Innovative Companies" list in 2016.
At the end of 2017, Liberty Global announced the decision to sell its operations in Austria, UPC Austria – the country's largest cable operator, to T-Mobile Austria for €1.9 billion, which was then rebranded Magenta Telekom
Magenta Telekom (T-Mobile Austria until 6 May 2019) is the second largest mobile and fixed company in Austria. It is owned by Deutsche Telekom. In 2017 it had 5.7 million customers. Its CEO is Andreas Bierwirth :de:Andreas_Bierwirth">de.html" ; ...
.
In January 2018, Liberty Latin America spun off from Liberty Global. The new publicly traded company, Liberty Latin America Ltd., operates independently throughout parts of the Caribbean and South America
South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the sout ...
.
In May 2018, Liberty Global announced the sale of its operations in Germany, Hungary, Romania and the Czech Republic to Vodafone for €19 billion ($22.7 billion). The sale closed for $21.3 billion in July 2019. All of these operations, formerly named UPC (Unitymedia
Vodafone GmbH is a mobile telecommunications operator in Germany headquartered in Düsseldorf. It provides mobile phone, LTE, 5G, cable internet, landlines, cable TV, and IPTV services. As of the third quarter of 2021, Vodafone GmbH has more ...
in Germany), were since rebranded to Vodafone. In December 2018, Liberty Global announced the sale of its DTH satellite TV operations in Hungary (''UPC Direct''), Czech Republic, Slovakia (in both named ''freeSAT'') and Romania (''Focus Sat'') to M7 Group
M7 Group (legally Canal+ Luxembourg S.à.r.l.) is a Luxembourg-based television provider which operates several direct broadcast satellite pay TV platforms: HD Austria in Austria, Télésat in Belgium and Luxembourg, TV Vlaanderen in the Flander ...
. Under M7 Group, Czech and Slovak operations were integrated with Skylink, Hungarian operations adopted ''Direct One'' name and logo, while Romanian operations retained its name, only changing its logo to match with its new parent.
In 2019, Liberty Global announced an initiative to offer broadband with speeds of 1 Gbps across several European cities through the company's GigaCities program.
In August 2020, Liberty Global announced that it would be buying Sunrise Communications AG for $7.4 billion.
The company attempted to acquire Sunrise Communications multiple times; according to Mike Fries, the chief executive officer of Liberty Global, "It wasn't a question of 'is this a good deal?' only a matter of how it would get done".
On the 11th November Sunrise became a subsidiary of Liberty Global.
In September 2021, Liberty Global announce the sale of its Polish operations to Iliad Group's subsidiary Play (P4) for $1.8bn. The transaction was closed on 1 April 2022.
Merger with Vodafone in the Netherlands
In June 2015, Vodafone
Vodafone Group plc () is a British multinational telecommunications company. Its registered office and global headquarters are in Newbury, Berkshire, England. It predominantly operates services in Asia, Africa, Europe, and Oceania.
, Vod ...
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
Vodafone Group plc () is a British multinational telecommunications company. Its registered office and global headquarters are in Newbury, Berkshire, England. It predominantly operates services in Asia, Africa, Europe, and Oceania.
, Vod ...
and Liberty Global would merge Dutch operations. Liberty's Dutch subsidiary, Ziggo, would work with Vodafone's mobile network. Vodafone paid Liberty €1 billion as part of the joint venture valued at €3.5 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
VodafoneZiggo Group Holding B.V. is a Dutch joint venture between Vodafone Plc and Ziggo B.V., announced in February 2016, approved by the European Commission in August 2016 and completed in December 2016.
VodafoneZiggo is headquartered in Ut ...
Group Holding B.V.
Innovations and investments
In 2013–2016, Liberty Global invested EUR 14.5 billion in infrastructure, including investments to bring high-speed internet to four million more European households through new build and upgrades.
In October 2017, Liberty Global opened the Telenet Innovation Center in Brussels, its second innovation hub alongside the Tech Campus near Amsterdam. The Innovation Center is focused on testing Internet of Things (IoT) solutions and mobile technologies, including the introduction and preparation of 5G networks.
Video properties
Liberty Global offers Netflix in 30 countries in Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean and other video-on-demand platforms as MaxDome in Germany, Play and Play More in Belgium, and MyPrime in Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Ireland, Switzerland and the Netherlands.
In 2017, Liberty Global partnered with affiliate Lionsgate and subsidiary premium channel Starz on a television series, '' The Rook''. The show, which premiered in summer 2019, is adapted by Stephenie Meyer
Stephenie Meyer (; née Morgan; born December 24, 1973) is an American novelist and film producer. She is best known for writing the vampire romance series ''Twilight'', which has sold over 100 million copies, with translations into 37 differ ...
from the novel of the same name written by Daniel O'Malley.
In February 2018, Liberty Global announced a partnership with Amazon Prime Video on the television series called '' The Feed'', premiering in 2019. The show was co-produced in partnership with the Amazon Studios
Amazon Studios is an American television and film producer and distributor that is a subsidiary of Amazon. It specializes in developing television series and distributing and producing films. It was started in late 2010. Content is distributed th ...
division and launched as an on-demand programme in Europe, Latin and North America.
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 televisions, 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
Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...
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. Horizon TV was also launched in Austria in 2016, making it available in all three German-speaking countries where Liberty Global operates.
In September 2018, Liberty Global announced the next-generation video platform Horizon 4.
Operations and shareholdings
Liberty Global operates through the following subsidiaries and shareholdings:
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
A video tape recorder (VTR) is a tape recorder designed to record and playback video and audio material from magnetic tape. The early VTRs were open-reel devices that record on individual reels of 2-inch-wide (5.08 cm) tape. They were us ...
, FLOW, Cabletica, Liberty, Más Móvil and BTC, as well as having a sub-sea fiber network.
In January 2018, Liberty Latin America
Liberty is the ability to do as one pleases, or a right or immunity enjoyed by prescription or by grant (i.e. privilege). It is a synonym for the word freedom.
In modern politics, liberty is understood as the state of being free within society f ...
spun off the main company and began operating independently from Liberty Global.
Liberty Latin America's operations consist of Liberty Puerto Rico
Liberty Communications of Puerto Rico LLC (d/b/a Liberty) is a telecommunications company that provides broadband Internet access, VoIP, television and wireless services covering the entire island of Puerto Rico (wireless in Puerto Rico and US Vi ...
, a provider of pay-TV, Internet, and telephone services in Puerto Rico
Puerto Rico (; abbreviated PR; tnq, Boriken, ''Borinquen''), officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico ( es, link=yes, Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico, lit=Free Associated State of Puerto Rico), is a Caribbean island and unincorporated ...
, and VTR
A video tape recorder (VTR) is a tape recorder designed to record and playback video and audio material from magnetic tape. The early VTRs were open-reel devices that record on individual reels of 2-inch-wide (5.08 cm) tape. They were us ...
, a Chile
Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...
a 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
Seychelles (, ; ), officially the Republic of Seychelles (french: link=no, République des Seychelles; Creole: ''La Repiblik Sesel''), is an archipelagic state consisting of 115 islands in the Indian Ocean. Its capital and largest city, ...
named Cable and Wireless Seychelles
Seychelles (, ; ), officially the Republic of Seychelles (french: link=no, République des Seychelles; Creole: ''La Repiblik Sesel''), is an archipelagic state consisting of 115 islands in the Indian Ocean. Its capital and largest city, ...
.
Europe
Liberty Global serves six countries in Europe and is among the largest cable operators in Belgium
Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to th ...
, Ireland
Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...
, the Netherlands
)
, anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau")
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, subdivision_type = Sovereign state
, subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands
, established_title = Before independence
, established_date = Spanish Netherl ...
, Slovakia
Slovakia (; sk, Slovensko ), officially the Slovak Republic ( sk, Slovenská republika, links=no ), is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east, Hungary to the south, Austria to the s ...
, Switzerland and the United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...
.
Merger of Virgin Media with O2 UK
On 7 May 2020, it was announced that Liberty Global and Telefónica
Telefónica, S.A. () is a Spanish multinational telecommunications company headquartered in Madrid, Spain. It is one of the largest telephone operators and mobile network providers in the world. It provides fixed and mobile telephony, broadba ...
had been in talks to merge their UK businesses in a deal worth an estimated £31bn. The merger would see Virgin Media
Virgin Media is a British telecommunications company which provides telephone, television and internet services in the United Kingdom. Its headquarters are at Green Park in Reading, England. It is owned by Virgin Media O2, a 50:50 joint ventu ...
and O2 form a 50:50 joint venture, making the combined business one of the UK's largest entertainment and telecommunications companies, with annual revenues of approximately US$13.6 billion and over 46 million subs.
The merger was subject to customary regulatory approval and, if approved, was to be completed by mid-2021. The merger was completed on 1 June 2021.
References
External links
*
{{authority control, state=expanded
Companies based in London
Companies listed on the Nasdaq
Tax inversions
Mass media companies established in 2005
Telecommunications companies established in 2005
Mass media companies of the United Kingdom
Telecommunications companies of the United Kingdom