Euskaltel ‘ready to kick-off’ Virgin-branded national campaign

Northern Spanish regional cable operator Euskaltel has said it is ready to kick-off its national expansion plan under the Virgin brand and has claimed already to be have a technical reach of over 13 million homes in Spain.

Euskaltel, which has licensed the Virgin brand to help drive expansion across Spain outside of its core northern Spanish homeland, said that it had successfully carried out tests with customers around Spain who have access to all convergent fixed and mobile phone services, ultra-fast broadband and 4K TV.

The operator provided the update on its plans as it posted respectable Q1 numbers, with revenue marginally up and EBITDa growing by 8.1% to €88 million.

Euskaltel added 59,000 products under contract in its residential base in the quarter, which it said reflected its focus on growing a high-value customers base. It added 36,500 newmobile phone lines, and 16,000 new TV service contracts. Broadband numbers were up to 17,000.

The group’s overall fixed customer base grew by just 400, most of them across its core northern Spanish territories of the Basque Country, Asturias and Galicia.

Euskaltel said it had met its financial targets for the first quarter, with the coronavirus crisis having a negative impact so far, despite Spain being the worst hit country in Europe so far.

Euskaltel has decided to stick with its dividend plans and will issue a dividend of €0.31 a share for 2019, with an additional dividend of €0.17 to be paid out on July 5.