Virgin Mobile
In November of 1999, Virgin Mobile began its operations; this was a joint venture between One2One (now Tmobile) and Virgin Group. Although it is not its own network (virtual mobile network), it does rely on the ever popular Tmobile network. And with a 10 year minimum agreement extended until at least 2014, customers can expect excellent services when they choose to sign up with the network for service offerings.
In only one year, the company gained a mass following and 500 K customers. In June of 2001 it had surpassed 1 million customers, which made it the UKs fastest growing mobile provider to date. In fact, in 2005, Virgin was found to be the most admired brand in the UK, providing a solid network infrastructure, and low prices to its customer base. With SMS to SMS, 3G, and a wide range of mobile services, as well as entertainment based services through the Virgin portal, the options are endless for those who want reliability, as well as affordability in a mobile provider.
Virgin Mobile later bought the entire company, to turn around and sell a part of it to ntl Inc. The company has a solid reputation as one of the leading companies to work for in the UK, and providing customers with the highest level of customer service in the mobile network. Although the company is still predominantly a pay as you go provider, it does offer a wide range of options for its customer base to choose from in terms of service needs. With this said, the company does have over 4 million users today, but hasn’t done too well in getting customers to sign on for contracts. With the ntl deal, the company did become the first in the UK to have the ability to offer quadruple play to customers. This includes: TV, fixed landline, mobile, and broadband. Although it hasn’t yet, in the near future the company hopes to alter the idea of contract plans, and get more customers to sign on with multiple services.