Comment Articles

Ntl and BT

Guy Kewney AnchorDesk

Published: 07 Sep 2001 16:27 BST

Ironic, isn't it, that at the time when BT is flogging off its wireless (cellphone) division - to the rage of its employees - its (equally struggling) rival ntl is launching a 10GHz waveband system for providing high speed Internet to homes.

For the life of me, I can't make sense of BT's decision to split itself into tiny components. Time was when I was pretty clear in my own mind about it: I reckoned it was a fiddle to get it out from the control of the regulator. But now, I wonder.

Officially, it's designed to reduce debt. Sell off Cellnet, sell off Genie, pocket the dosh. That makes a sort of sense; when the household is in trouble, you flog off the family silver. But you don't kill the goose that lays the golden eggs and sell its meat! - and you certainly don't plan the slaughter long before the family budget collapses or looks like it might collapse.

And the sell-off was planned more than a year ago; in fact, the deal to make the sell-off possible was set up before the dot-com crash. And indeed, it was set up when all the dot-com millionaires were poncing around the City in fast cars.

I know, because I was there at the launch, when Ignite and the other brands were first unveiled. The main question on everybody's list was: "How rich will the directors of these new subsidiaries be when they go public?" and the answer, from the very top, was: "You can probably tell who will make the most by the casual nature of their dress!"