A little like oom really from my point of view - I believe they are the favoured company within their sector and despite the markets - Oftel and the G3 nonsense they will climb back. They pay a divi and this wioll be seen to be increasingly important in the days to come. They have new management and are looking to enhance shareholder value .....

I hold and swing trade a few and not adverse to intraday trading them.

ains


BT in web-based investor relations drive

London, February 7 2003, (netimperative)



by Chris Lake

BT is launching a web-based scheme which it hopes will improve communications with its retail shareholders and help cut costs.


Dubbed 'ShareholderPlus', the system allows investors to sign up and receive BT communications - such as reports, news releases, mandates and, subject to a change in the law, electronic tax vouchers - by email, rather than by post.

BT said this will help it achieve cost savings - by not having to print and despatch reports - and pointed out that it is also good for the environment.

Furthermore, it has negotiated a number of deals with companies such as Virgin Wines, Apollo Travel, RSA and National Car Rental, to market the service and said it will add new offers in the future if it proves to be a success.

BT claims to be one of the first FTSE100 companies to launch such a programme, though it is likely that more will follow.

www.btplc.com/shareholderplus

Monday 24 February 2003, 11:28:25 AM
United Kingdom
Written by Sarah Brown
BT have struck a deal with Internet security solutions firm, SonicWALL, Inc. who, under the contract, will supply products from its range of firewall appliances, which will form BTs entry-level firewall offering to its web hosting customers.

140/150 still looking likley as pension poss looking worse than first thought

not aware that it looked worse .... BT just following the market down with FTSE100 down nearly 3% - sector about the same ...... there is just one top 100 riser at this time and thats just a maths thing on two decimal places


ains



BT denies it needs 1.5bn pension plug

Richard Wray
Tuesday February 25, 2003
The Guardian

BT yesterday moved to quell fears that it will have to make a massive one-off payment into its pension fund to deal with an ever-deepening funding black
hole.

The company's auditor, Watson Wyatt, is still carrying out a five-month audit of BT's pension fund, which has 346,000 members and is one of the largest in the private sector.

Earlier this month BT insiders indicated that the fund could be as much as 2.5bn in the red, compared with 1bn three years ago, because of the decline in the value of shares since the heady days of the dotcom boom.

The company's triennial funding valuation is calculated using everything from share price levels to property values. The current audit is expected to be completed by May.

When the last triennial audit was carried out the company increased its annual payment into the fund by 200m over five years.

That payment is expected to increase slightly, with BT rolling its top-up payments over a longer period in order to boost the fund.

Speculation that the company will have to make a 1.5bn one-off payment to cover liabilities was denied yesterday.

"Our actuaries have indicated to us that they see no reason for us to significantly increase our annual top-up payments," a BT spokesman said.

The collapse in share prices across the world has left a number of leading British companies, including Rolls-Royce and British Airways, nursing large pension fund deficits.

Many companies which had been able to take "pension holidays" are finding it necessary to pour money into their funds in order to cover recent losses.

Pharmaceuticals group GlaxoSmithKline, which employs more than 100,000 people, recently announced its fund was 1.3bn in the red.

according to express today even if contributions upped to 250mil a year this would still take 20 YEARS to plug but dresner report says not even 300 mil year would be enough that is taking at todays stock market value if it drops even further which looks likley then they will have large prob and with market share dropping ie twt/ntl etc with less revenue coming in etc that does not bode well for future share price

Clearly the market is about people taking opposing views .... the review of the pension fund is yet to take place. The fund was closed a while back and I believe the staff and the trustees are happy with the situation and the measures that are being proposed. As and when the markets improve so BT will gain both ways. Market share is not what it's all about. That's just one factor in the marketing/pricing/ (and more importantly) net profits mix.

Bt are still the preferred supplier and preferred company within the sector. I use all the companies you mention and have recently disconnected TWT line as it is far more expensive than BT.

If you believe there will be a further financial meltdown then clearly you will sell both BT and the market ..... I think we are close to the bottom and therefore a bull on the market and BT. In a year or so we will see who is right.


ains

i think the share price has further to go down yet but im not saying it is a basket case by any means as if the war starts the markets could rally and a lot of the pension deficit would be wiped out but short term with the pension , war etc i think the bears will win the case i have a order for 145 so if it reaches that i will snaffle a few thousand up


Biffa

We will see .... yesterday it was about the market and especially the pensions situation - clearly not helped by the PRU. but believe way oversold. I took the advantage of adding at 154.5p just ahead of the close - as a ST trade expecting a bounce today/tomorrow (see trading thread for tuesday) Still happy to hold as a longer term play.


ains

Quite a few FTSE shares are holding up...i think its about basket case shares getting nailed.Might buy some a bit lower,predictions are for a low in the coming weeks.

BT was 176 when this thread was started,now 155..quite a fall in a few weeks.

BT are about the same as sector over the same period and tracking the FTSE100 quite closely.

Clearly the pension thingy is haveing an over adverse effect - still happy to hold with average around sub 160p at this time




ains

Needs to stay above 153p



Broadband appeal

RESIDENTS across the region are being urged to register their interest in broadband in a bid to bring the high-speed internet service to more exchanges in Dumfries and Galloway.

Currently, the service is only available to users of the Dumfries telecommunications exchange, allowing householders and businesses access to the internet and send e-mails ten times faster than by dial-up modem.

Dumfries MP Russell Brown recently visited Blaines Restaurant in the town to find out how broadband is benefiting businesses and he met with British Telecom to discuss how broadband can be extended to more areas in the region.

With the enabling of an exchange costing up to 500,000, BT told Mr Brown it needs to ensure there is a genuine and reasonable demand before the investment is made.

The firm has launched a registration scheme, with trigger marks, at which point they will install broadband.

In Dumfries and Galloway, out of the 13 other exchanges, only Stranraer has been set a trigger target. But that is at 300 and only 61 customers have registered.

Mr Brown said: If 300 customers register in Stranraer, BT will bring broadband to them.

However, BT Scotland has also said that even if an exchange has not been allocated a trigger, it will still check the number of customers registered against it.

I know from local people contacting my office that people outwith Dumfries would like the opportunity to access broadband.

If sufficient demand is shown in areas such as Annan, Langholm, Moffat and Lockerbie, then BT says it will consider giving an exchange a trigger level to meet and right now, that is currently the best way of bringing broadband into the area with all the benefits that will accrue for businesses and consumers.

So it is in everyones interest that as many people as possible register their interest in broadband. With access to it, businesses can gain a vital competitive edge in sales, marketing and customer service operations and make significant savings in their operating costs.

02/27 09:56
BT Signs Five-Year Communications Agreement With Honeywell
By Dex McLuskey


London, Feb. 27 (Bloomberg) -- BT Group Plc, the U.K.'s biggest phone company, said it signed an agreement to provide communications services to Honeywell International Inc., the biggest maker of cockpit electronics, in western Europe. Terms weren't disclosed.

BT's BT Ignite unit, which supplies faster Internet services to European businesses, will provide voice, data, cellular, video and Web services to Morristown, New Jersey-based Honeywell under the five-year accord, the companies said in an e-mailed statement.

BT is seeking to boost corporate business after competition from rivals including Cable & Wireless Plc and WorldCom Inc. pushed its share of voice services to such customers down to 44 percent in the U.K. in the three months to Dec. 31. BT in November signed a 1 billion-pound ($1.58 billion) contract to manage communications for Unilever, the biggest food and soap maker.

BT's shares, which have lost 21 percent of their value in the past year, rose as much as 2.6 percent, or 4 pence, to 157.75p and were trading at 154.5p as of 9:44 a.m. in London.

Hit a new low this afternoon as market heads south in front of US open

ains



BT begins trial of extended-reach ADSL
[PC Pro] 13:17

BT is bidding to stretch its ADSL broadband service over a greater distance. The goal is to put more people within the reach of phone line-based broadband.
Currently, 5.5km is the maximum distance for receiving ADSL services from a local exchange. BT, however, is now trialling ADSL services over a distance of 6km. While its still at a very early stage, customer trials are due to begin at the end of March.

The importance of this whole issue is that the greater the distance supported, the more people can benefit from their local exchange being ADSL-enabled and more people have more choice for broadband. ADSL is the provision of broadband over PSTN (public switched telephone network), as opposed to the less-prevalent cable or satellite-based services.

The challenge facing BT - involving the basic laws of physics - is to preserve effective bandwidth over greater distances. 'We have to make sure the impact on quality is not so great that the product wouldn't be commercially viable,' said a BT spokesperson.

ADVERTISEMENT

They emphasised that no firm timetable yet existed for the possible implementation of the service

Issues to be met include the guaranteeing of contention ratios. For longer distances, the same bandwidth may be available to fewer customers, potentially increasing the service costs per user for ISPs.

Originally, a 3km limit existed for the provision of broadband from ADSL-enabled exchanges.

BT Wholesale has just brought its ADSL-based business services in line with existing domestic offerings. It has extended the reach of its 500Kbits/sec 'BT DataStream Office' service to 5.5km from a local exchange.


Alun Williams

ADSL base growing reports Oftel
[PC Pro] 13:11

According to Oftel's latest report, 66 per cent of UK households are now covered by an ADSL-enabled exchange. The UK telecoms regulator says that 1,144 BT exchanges are able to deliver ADSL.
However, given the distance constraints on running an ADSL service not all households are close enough within an area. Oftel concedes that this reduces the real ADSL coverage to 63 per cent. The total take-up of ADSL now stands at 640,000.

All these figures are valid as of 31 January 2003.

Oftel also reports on enhancement to the 'BT DataStream Office 500kbit/sec End User Access' product. BT Wholesale has extended the reach of its 500kbit/sec service to 5.5km from the local exchange. This applies to new orders.

Oftel has re-jigged its online DSL information resources. Its Local Loop Unbundling Fact Sheet has been merged with its ADSL Brief to form the DSL Fact Sheet. The first edition of the new document - with its broadband-related facts and figures - has just been made available. You can find it at www.oftel.gov.uk, along with the old fact sheets.

Alun Williams

MPs' broadband revolt gathers pace
27/02/2003
Editor: David Minto

Its not only the probable war in Iraq that British MPs are revolting on

ZDNet has reported that over 100 MPs have now signed a motion put forward by the MP Jim Knight to compel the government to do more in prompting BT to roll out broadband to rural areas. 115MPs have declared their support since December 2002, and the list is still attracting names.

As well as urging BT to disclose more specific information about its plans for broadband roll out, the motion also calls for greater cross-departmental cooperation in the governments approach to the project.

The MPs supporting the motion are concerned that, though BT claims that four-fifths of the UKs homes will be able to access its ADSL network by 2005, its plans are insufficiently detailed and the geographical lines of the digital divide have not been made clear. There is also concern about projects which do not offer higher bandwidth than ADSL.

BT, however, has said that the distribution of ADSL roll out will depend on consumer demand. Broadband operators Telewest and NTL are not currently thought to be in a financial position to expand their networks in the significant way still required.

AINS

u still holding the BT u bought mid 1.70s ?

151 now..breaking support.looks like u will need to buy more to keep averaging down.its only money !

They are just about on support now - charts do not look promising and over the last few weeks they have underperformed both the sector and the market but that's only part of the story and still happy to hold. The pension thingy has proved to be more of a negative than I had anticipated.


ains

with the most bearish brokers thinking BT is worth around 1.50..any further drops I think will be a good op to go long,really oversold now. still watching.

Talking to someone over dinner about the Indian Call Centres - They have just come back from Bombay where they have been training the new call centre staff. They get about 2K a year and tend to be well educated and because of local conditions will stay with the job. This not only makes it cheaper to route the calls there but should be more efficient (The English spoken may well have a London accent :-))

I can see myself adding a few more in the morning .....


ains

3.4GHz auction: All systems go
17:45 Thursday 27th February 2003
Graeme Wearden


Details about the new wireless broadband auction have hit the Web ahead of a government announcement on Friday. All the auction needs now is some bidders
The forthcoming 3.4GHz wireless broadband auction has been given a provisional starting date of 26 May.

The government is expected to announce full details on Friday, but the Radiocommunications Agency (RA) published the information memorandum on its Web site on Thursday. A deadline to register interest for the 3.4GHz auction has been set at 14 April -- although this could change. The early date for this deadline is designed to help the government weed out unsuitable candidates.

The RA has revealed that the auction will run for two weeks, and that any licences that are left over after 6 June will still be available for at least another year.

Fifteen 3.4GHz licences are on offer -- seven covering metropolitan areas, seven covering rural areas, and one for Northern Ireland. This distribution has caused some controversy, especially in Wales where politicians and industry figures fought in vain for two Wales-only licences.

The government hopes that companies will use 3.4GHz to offer wireless broadband services in rural areas. However, there are concerns that the auction may flounder because large telcos decline to take part in it. BT, NTL and Telewest are all expected not to take part.

This has left the government hoping that smaller players will take part, and the DTI explained on Thursday that this could include Regional Development Agencies. "A Regional Development Agency would be able to take part in the auction, as long as they did so in partnership with a company," a DTI spokesman told ZDNet, explaining that a public-private partnership between an RDA and a commercial operator would be acceptable.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

BT demonstrates web-based ID checker
by Gillian Law
All your details in one handy place
Friday, 28 February 2003




BT yesterday demonstrated concept web services, including an identity checking product that it predicts will be the "ubiquitous verification service for business and government".
The service, called Uru, was jointly developed by BT and software company BG Group. It takes the identification details provided by an individual and compares them to a range of databases, including UK registers of names and addresses, death registers, the national telephone directory services database and the Meter Point Asset Number database maintained by the UK electricity companies.

Uru is currently CD-based but an online version is set for launch too.

The Uru service works by asking customers to provide several forms of identification that, used alone, could easily be forged. Armed with more indepth information it can quickly check whether an individual is who he or she says they are and whether they really live where they claim.

"Existing systems used in the UK are based on credit worthiness, not on identity. All they're interested in is whether you're good for the money. So if a fraudster manages to take or copy your ID, it's like an open cheque book," said BG group chief executive Richard Law.

Uru does not disclose personal information. Instead, it checks that the information provided is correct.

There are over two billion authentication transactions taking place every year in the UK, most of them in the financial, retail and government sectors, according to Law.

The databases currently available to Uru won't solve all identity issues indeed, they only confirm identity in about 50 percent of cases at the moment, Law said. But they are an important first step and BG Group is currently speaking to the UK Passport Office about putting its information in the public domain as well as to the DVLA (Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency) and Inland Revenue.

"I predict that in 10 years time, 90 percent of identity checks will be done this way," said Law.

The UK government has over 100,000 databases, in a very fragmented system, and is looking to make the information more useful, Law said. If, for example, digital certification is to work, identity checking will be essential, he said. While BG Group has "no formal backing from the government," Law is aware of no other company able to provide the information needed.

"So we believe we're poised to grab that market," he added.