Euskaltel outlines Virgin telco ambition to be national Spanish player

José Miguel García at the Virgin telco launch press conference

Spanish regional operator Euskaltel has taken the first steps towards its national launch, which will see the operator provide services to the 85% of the country in which it does not yet operate under the Virgin telco brand.

The operator plans to use the Virgin brand to target some 18.4 million homes across the country as the cornerstone of its business plan for the next five years. Euskaltel currently provides services primarily in the regions of the Basque Country, Asturias and Galicia, where it operates under the Euskaltel, Telecable and R brands, although it has launched limited service offerings in contiguous territories in northern Spain.

Euskaltel’s management said they were confident that that half of its customers would be located in new regions outside its core territories targeted by the Virgin launch. It said it was hopeful that t its 2019 revenues will have doubled -up from €685 million to €1.3 billion over that period, with some 40% of total revenue coming from the Virgin telco business within five years.

Euskaltel expects the move will more than double the current customer base both in fixed and mobile services. It expects to multiply its current fixed services customer base by 2.3 to over 1.5 million customers, taking on around 800,000 new fixed service customers from the markets included in the expansion strategy.

Contracts for mobile services are also expected to exceed three million in 2025, compared to the current one million.

The company said in its presentation that it aimed to offer a value proposition combining fixed and mobile broadband and telephony and TV that provided reat customer service at  competitive prices.

Euskaltel said that the Virgin brand had over 75% recognition in Spain.

CEO Jose Miguel Garcia describes this as “a landmark event in the Euskaltel Group’s history and for telecommunications in Spain also. 20 years ago, a dream was set in motion with a group of innovative thinkers and today we take yet another step forward by including Virgin as a Group brand. Our customers should be proud to be a part of this piece of history and to know that they will always have access to the best telecommunications services”.

He said that “Euskaltel is the only national operator with its decision-making centre outside Madrid, holding on to its roots in the regions where it started out.”