Virgin Media Inc. is a company which provides fixed and mobile telephone, television and broadband internet services to businesses and consumers in the United Kingdom. Its executive office is in New York City, United States and its operational headquarters are in Hook, United Kingdom.
The company was formed in March 2006 by the merger of NTL and Telewest, which created NTL:Telewest. A further merger with Virgin Mobile UK in July 2006 created the first "quadruple-play" media company in the United Kingdom, offering television, internet, mobile phone and fixed-line telephone services. All of the company's consumer services were rebranded under the Virgin Media name in February 2007.
Virgin Media owns and operates its own fibre-optic cable network, the only national cable network in the United Kingdom. As of 31 December 2010 it had a total of approximately 4.8 million cable customers, of whom around 3.78 million were supplied with its television services (Virgin TV), around 4.01 million with broadband internet services and around 4.16 million with fixed-line telephony services. At the same date it had around 3.07 million mobile telephony customers. Virgin Media competes primarily with BSkyB, BT Group, Everything Everywhere, O2, TalkTalk and Vodafone.
Virgin Media has a primary listing on the NASDAQ Stock Market and is a constituent of the NASDAQ-100 index. It has a secondary listing on the London Stock Exchange.
Famous quotes containing the words virgin and/or media:
“Where the Youth pined away with desire,
And the pale Virgin shrouded in snow,
Arise from their graves and aspire,
Where my Sun-flower wishes to go.”
—William Blake (1757–1827)
“Never before has a generation of parents faced such awesome competition with the mass media for their children’s attention. While parents tout the virtues of premarital virginity, drug-free living, nonviolent resolution of social conflict, or character over physical appearance, their values are daily challenged by television soaps, rock music lyrics, tabloid headlines, and movie scenes extolling the importance of physical appearance and conformity.”
—Marianne E. Neifert (20th century)