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

Good article ainsey! It's about BT, which is a company with shares! Nice work!

F

BT going well and at 180p intraday - up 3.61% along with the market and the sector - slightly outperforming with Bagdad said to be just 2 days away at this time ..... 5 week high

ains



Government backs industry broadband strategy
10:34 Friday 21st March 2003
Tony Hallett, silicon.com


The government has accepted a list of suggestions from the Broadband Stakeholder Group, but ensuring action will still be a challenge
The government has responded to suggestions from the UK's Broadband Stakeholder Group (BSG) and so far the pressure group likes what it's heard.

In a written statement to the House of Commons, E-minister Stephen Timms said: "Broadband in the UK has really taken off over the last year. We now have one of the most competitive markets in Europe -- with a wide choice of technology and some of the lowest prices worldwide.



"I am very pleased to accept the recommendations of the BSG. We are already taking much of the work forward."

The BSG, in its second annual report, made 15 recommendations and the government has broadly accepted all of them. In some quarters the government is still seen as holding back broadband rollout by failing to twist the arm of service providers -- as other countries have done -- and neglecting rural areas, but the BSG is nevertheless encouraged.

BSG chief executive Antony Walker said: "This is pretty positive and shows we are singing from the same hymn sheet. But agreeing to everything doesn't mean it won't be challenging (for them) to deliver on their commitments."

In particular, the government is looking for the public sector to aggregate its demand for broadband in certain areas, with the help of the Broadband Task Force. This makes it economical for service providers -- generally BT, in most areas -- to serve a community, including homes and the private sector.

Walker said this policy is going well but still has "huge challenges". For example, pooling procurement can slow down rollout.

Wireless is another area where the government must move carefully. Broadband local area networks, typically using a strain of the 802.11 standard, are a way of cheaply sharing high speed connections, but carving up spectrum usage can be problematic.

The government has committed funds to make sure of the necessary project management expertise for creating a workable integrated broadband approach.

The BSG's Walker added: "We don't need a tsar or someone else evangelising. They have good people in their team already but they are simply over-worked."

E-minister Timms pointed out that over 32,000 people and businesses are signing up to broadband every week in the UK right now and more than 70 percent of the population can get a high-speed connection.

On Thursday analyst house Datamonitor forecast that broadband will soon become a mass-market phenomenon across Europe.

Last retreat for BT's prancing piper
23 March 2003, Mail on Sunday

HE BT piper is preparing to blow his last fanfare. The logo, introduced in 1991 in a controversial 50m makeover, is now considered tired, out-of-date and no longer representative of what the telecoms giant does.






Designed by corporate stylists Woolf Olins, the piper was never popular with disgruntled staff, who faxed each other obscene variants.



They were also horrified at the huge sums spent on the logo while BT was in the middle of its first wave of mass redundancies. Critics also pointed out how similar the prancing piper was to a logo used by Royal Insurance's arts sponsorship programme.



But one former BT executive closely involved with the launch said it was 'an image that people grew to love'.


'I didn't like it at the time but it did work quite well,' he said. 'We had to drop the name British Telecom because we could not use it as a trademark in Europe. The piper was good because we could base advertising around it.'


This time round, BT is likely to go for a low-key rebranding launch as it gradually phases out the piper over the three-year lifecycle of BT vans. The logo was updated with slightly different colours in 1999.


'Whatever happens, you won't see the company spending a fortune to repaint everything on the same day,' said a BT spokesman.


Corporate rebranding exercises are now fraught affairs for firms. Changing the Royal Mail's name to Consignia in 2001 was a total flop and last year it became the Royal Mail again. And BA infamously suffered a snub from former Prime Minister Margaret


Thatcher when it dropped the Union flag from its tailfins in favour of ethnic designs.


One BT insider said that at a meeting of 200 senior marketing staff in London before Christmas, 'it was made pretty clear that the image was tired'. He added: 'In 1991, BT was a phone company. It is a different company now.'


A BT spokesman said: 'The logo is under review. No final decision has been taken.'


BT is believed to be looking for pitches from advertising companies. Woolf Olins, which was paid 4 million for the old logo, is unlikely to be in the running. A BT executive said: 'The piper has run out of puff.'

New homes to be primed for broadband
17:47 Monday 24th March 2003
Graeme Wearden


Building regulations could be altered in an attempt to make it easier to install cables in and around new houses
Builders could be forced to make all new homes broadband-friendly by installing cable ducts and chambers into the fabric of the building if government proposals published earlier this month become law.

The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister has presented the building industry with several possible changes to existing regulations. They would, if implemented, help increase broadband take-up by making it much easier for households to install cables in and around their home, and the most far-reaching would cost the building industry an estimated 70m per year.

BT customers get help to watch TV!
Tuesday 25 March 2003, 6:39:58 AM
United Kingdom
Written by Peter Harris
BT Openworld customers no longer have any excuse for missing their favourite television programmes.


The ISP has teamed up with Onthebox.com to offer a text-based TV reminder service. Customers sign up online and click on selected programmes from a wide range of regional, national, cable, satellite and specialist channels - from Anglia to Zee TV. Alerts are then delivered via SMS to their mobile phone 15 minutes, one hour, two hours or six hours before the programme starts.


Customers should go to www.btopenworld.com, to access the service and register their details. Alerts are priced at 25p per text.


Nick Hazell, online director at BT Openworld said: "We aim to provide the best tools for our customers. This particular service is designed to help users take time out of their busy lives to watch the programmes they enjoy. Lets face it, weve all meant to watch our favourite soap or an interesting documentary, but got sidetracked by other things. Now, thanks to a combination of the internet and mobile technologies, theres no excuse."


Stuart Horwood, managing director BT Wholesale markets, who provided the technology, said: "We are delighted to be announcing this SMS service which demonstrates BT Wholesales ability to provide applications for consumer-facing lifestyle products as well as its established infrastructure solutions."


Charles Black, of Onthebox.com, who are supplying the programme listings, said: "Text alerts are a very exciting addition to the Onthebox TV listings as they enable users to get added benefit from the service. Our research and testing of the service have shown that the programme alerts will be very popular. Weve partnered with BT Wholesale to deliver the SMS functionality and are delighted that the service is being launched exclusively on BT Openworld".

BT Wholesale have released details of plans to extend the number of SDSL exchanges from 22 upto 100. This extension is due to be completed by the end of May 2003. With a commercial launch of the service this summer.

We are lead to believe by information passed on by Service Providers involved in the SDSL trials that the rollout will be something like:
14th April: 28 exchanges in Greater London, Greater Manchester and parts of Yorkshire
19th April: 11 exchanges in Greater London
28th April: 17 exchanges in the West Midlands
12th May: 22 exchanges in Scotland

BT Unveils New Speeds
British Telecom, Telewest, begin race
British Telecom today unveiled several upgrades to their DSL offerings that are in the works, including a 1Mbps broadband service to be launched sometime next year, with trials starting this Autumn. The company also announced it would be modifying its "trigger levels" (or how many subscribers are needed near a rural CO to warrant installation), as well as expanding the range for the company's 512Kbps ADSL offering. BT also says its SDSL offerings will be extended from their existing 22 local exchanges to a total of 100 by this May, with a commercial launch of the technology scheduled for this summer. Calling BT a "one trick pony" UK cable provider Telewest announced plans for a new 2MB service the same day.

ZDN - Both the government and BT must do more to help the creation of high-speed wireless networks in the UK if Broadband Britain is to become a reality, MPs said on Tuesday.

Leading a debate on broadband in rural areas, Sir George Young MP criticised the government for not doing enough to close a digital divide which currently means that somewhere between 80 and 90 percent of rural areas have no access to affordable broadband.



According to Sir George, the government has failed thus far to give out full details of how it will deliver broadband to every school, hospital and GP's surgery, as promised by Prime Minister Tony Blair last November.

Many MPs are keen to see this commitment fulfilled in such a way that the wider community also benefits -- perhaps by ADSL-enabling the local exchange or installing a Wi-Fi connection that could be shared by surrounding households in the evenings -- rather than a solution such as using leased lines that wouldn't be shared.

"A bolder and preferable target for the government would be to specify a delivery mechanism for schools which would bring both opportunities for that school, and automatically pull through additional broadband infrastructure to rural areas that might otherwise have to wait a long time for broadband under normal commercial conditions," said Sir George.

Several other MPs backed this point, and two urged e-commerce minister Stephen Timms to make the 2GHz band available to telcos.

"The government has not released the 'sweet spot' 2GHz spectrum," said Sir George, adding that the government had to make a decision between concentrating on making the maximum revenue through spectrum auctions and on making appropriate spectrum available.

Timms did not address this point in his response to the comments raised in the debate, though.

BT has been urging the government to give it access to 2GHz for months -- a request that had been refused, as the spectrum is already used by military and security services. Some experts, though, have indicated that 2GHz is not the best spectrum for broadband and that telcos should look at 3.4GHz, 5.8GHz and even 28GHz.

Although some MPs congratulated BT for its recent broadband initiatives such as its registration scheme and its mini-DSLAMs, the telco did not escape criticism.

Richard Allan MP pointed out that the telco had the power to either help or hinder the work of community activists who are trying to build broadband wireless networks in their area, and suggested that BT should offer an affordable product to link these networks to its backbone.

"We need some imagination from the providers of fixed line networks, who are in a position to encourage or discourage wireless rollout. Wi-Fi groups aren't allowed to feed all their traffic down one ADSL line, so BT could come up with an innovative and helpful contract for these people. It wouldn't have to be free, just competitively priced," suggested Allan.

In his response, Timms agreed that wireless had a key role to play, and suggested that the upgrading of public sector buildings to broadband could help bring down the cost of connecting Wi-Fi networks to the Internet.

"The solution isn't that government provides subsidies for broadband. Instead, it's the public sector's role as a customer that is so important. We need to maximise that demand, and ensure that it is used to bring broadband to local communities," Timms told the assembled MPs.

Timms added that he had recently visited a company called Rutland Online that is setting up a Wi-Fi network which had told him that 50,000 of their projected 90,000 spending over two years was made up of network backhaul costs. By upgrading building such as schools to broadband, the government might help to bring this cost down by helping to create more infrastructure, Timms suggested.

BT has offered thousands of its workers a 3.8 per cent pay rise.

The Communication Workers Union has recommended that its members accept the deal, which will benefit around 80,000 workers, ranging from operators to engineers.

A ballot of workers will start next week and the result will be announced mid-April.

A BT spokesman said: We believe it is an offer which acknowledges the contribution of our employees.

By Quentin Reade

BT to trial 1Mbps ADSL
By Tim Richardson
Posted: 25/03/2003 at 15:10 GMT


BT is to trial a new home-based 1Mbps ADSL service in the autumn which, if successful, could be rolled-out as a full commercial service before the end of the year.

News of BT's decision to provide a 1Mbps service comes on the same day that Telewest said it plans to trial a 2Mbps service for its consumers ahead of a full launch later this year.

BT Wholesale also confirmed that it now has more than 750,000 ADSL-connected end users and - despite some doubts - is on target to hit one million broadband punters by the summer.

In a raft of announcements made today, BT Wholesale claims that it is listening to its customers (ie. ISPs) and is working to offer new services.

Many of today's announcements are merely teasers for trials and pilots for later in the year and in some cases full details, such as pricing and spec, have yet to be finalised. However, today's announcements give an idea of BT's progress on broadband.

For example, as well as trialling a 1Mbps service for the home, BT Wholesale is also to test an entry-level 256Kbps product in the autumn. However, there are indications that BT does not regard this as being a true "broadband" service and is unlikely to market it as such, even though this will be an ADSL product.
Prices and other details surrounding both the 256Kbps and 1Mbps services are expected to be announced in the summer.

BT is also planning to extend the reach of its ADSL service which it claims will mean that an extra 600,000 households in DSL-enabled areas should be able to hook up to broadband. The reason why they can't lies in the fact that BT's 512Kbps ADSL service is only effective up to a range of around 5.5km from the exchange. Beyond that, and the line can suffer a reduction in signal strength leading to a duff service.

However, the telco now reckons it can effectively extend the range to 6km and still maintain a decent line quality to provide a 512Kbps ADSL service. The predictions are that 97 per cent of those connected to ADSL-enabled exchanges will now be within reach when this new initiative finally goes live sometime in June.

On a similar note, BT is also mulling whether to introduce a "simple fix" that would mean people connected to their local exchange via optical fibre (which doesn't support ADSL) - rather than copper - should be able to get broadband. Once again, more details of this are expected to be published next month will a full service launch pencilled in for June.

Providing an update on its broadband demand registration scheme, BT reports that so far 300,000 people from non-DSL areas have registered their interest in ADSL. So far 35 exchanges have been upgraded as a direct result of the scheme with a further 206 in the process of being upgraded by BT.

By next Monday, BT expects to publish triggers for a further 102 exchanges where demand has been strong but which have so far not been given thresholds.

Finally, BT is also expanding trials of its SDSL service from the current 22 exchanges to 100, with a view to launching the service commercially in August this year.

155 now.......new lows coming or a bounce from previous lows around 1.45?

Clearly they will move with the market and the sector ..... not sure that should move with the war news ..... but that's the market

This looks good


LONDON (Reuters) - BT Group has said it will cut prices on evening and weekend phone calls in the UK, making some charges up to 20 times cheaper than those of its main rivals.
BT Together customers will pay six pence for up to an hour on all evening and weekend calls made in the UK, BT BT.L said in a statement. The BT Together scheeme will see the end of per-minute charging for all evening and weekend calls with one rate for UK and local calls.

Market seems to like the marketing initiative - up 3% @ 167p




LONDON (AFX) - BT Group PLC, the UK's dominant telecom provider, said it would cut call costs on its most popular household offer BT Together from June 1, making it up to 20 times cheaper than its main rivals.

The company said it will scrap per-minute charging for all evening and weekend calls and make distance irrelevant, with one rate for UK and local calls.

Under the new scheme BT's 10 mln BT Together customers will pay 6 pence for up to an hour on all evening and weekend calls made to anywhere in the UK.

According to prices quoted by BT, 30-minute and 1 hour national evening calls with One.Tel cost 78 pence and 1.53 stg, compared with 6 pence under BT Together.

A single 10-minute national evening call using Carphone Warehouse costs 13 pence more. At the weekend British Gas charge 45 pence for a 30-minute call, and the Post Office 1.08 stg, said the company.

Angus Porter, managing director of BT Retail's consumer division, said: "We are determined to be competitive and build on our position as the consumer champion in fixed-line telephony."

"Claims by some competitors of savings over BT are often just plain misleading, as they are based on comparisons with our standard rate, which is only for customers for whom it would not be economic to be on a fixed call package," he added.

Speaking on a conference call with reporters, Porter said, "a number of people have indicated they can come into the market and have easy pickings."

"This is designed to be a very strong signal to everybody that we intend to protect our market share," he added.

Analysts estimate the impact of price changes on BT's revenues will be too small to show up.

CSFB said, in a research note, that total local and national calls account for about 1.8 bln stg of revenues, of which about half are residential, and about half of these residential customers are on BT Together.

In turn less than half of these revenues (about 200 mln stg of revenues) are from off-peak call minutes, said CSFB.

Still moving up @ 172p up 6% intraday :-))



BT has found a way to fight back against its fixed line rivals and make money; the shares are up and it looks good news for investors unless consumers cotton on to what lies beneath today's price changes.


BT, a long-standing Citywire tip, has made much of the 'radical' price changes it has announced today for its millions of fixed line customers, claiming it is 'up to 20 times cheaper than its major rivals'.

The move is clearly designed to try to protect its existing customer base from the ever-increasing competition. Recently Carphone Warehouse has entered the fray to sell fixed line telephony as well as mobile, and announced a deal to run a service for Sainsbury. Tesco is another contender as are One.Tel and cable operators Telewest and NTL.

But 'radical' does not mean cut-price and close inspection of the changes reveals most customers will actually be forced to pay much more for their calls.

BT confirms this. Although increased marketing costs will hit earnings in the short term it expects payback in 12 months and to increase revenue and profits thereafter. This is why its shares are up 8.5p to 170.5p.

How come? Interestingly, BT (BT.A) does not actually use the words price 'cuts' in today's announcement, which is nevertheless supposed to stop its 20 million residential household customers from fleeing to the competition.

BT's new offer is for customers of its BT Together package, who, it says, will pay only 6p for up to an hour on all evening and weekend calls made to anywhere in the UK.

The telecoms giant also criticises rivals for comparing their prices with BT's 'standard' rates rather than its discounted packaged rates.

However, Charles Wigoder, chief executive of smaller rival Telecom Plus (TEP), the London-listed supplier of fixed and mobile telephony as well as gas and electricity, reckons the 6p rate will actually mean a 20% price increase for the average BT customer.

Wigoder reckons that the average call length for domestic calls is under 4 minutes. BT's current evening and weekend rate is 1p a minute with a minimum fee of 5p, so Wigoder maintains that those customers making an average, sub-four minute phone call will now pay 6p instead of 5p.

On top of this, the BT rates apply to BT Together packages, which cost from 11.50 a month to 28.50 for a deal that gives the user the first hour of calls free at any time of day.

'I heard BT was making this announcement today and came into the office with trepidation. I expected them to do something competitive, but I'm delighted with this,' Wigoder said.

Fixed line telephony was worth some 5.2 billion in revenues to BT in 2002. The deals announced today apply only to standard fixed line calls within the UK. They do not apply to premium rate number, calls to mobile phones, calls to special numbers such as 0845 or 0870-pre-fixed numbers or to international calls.Citywire Verdict:

The good news is that BT feels rattled enough by the competition to actually start knocking competitors' pricing policies, but the bad news is that unless you regularly spend more than six minutes on each evening and weekend call, it doesn't like you're going to be any better off.

As consumers we are now bombarded by different rates and tariffs from our mobile and fixed line operators, which makes working out who is really better off, the customer or the operators, a bit of a nightmare.

Investors should be encouraged that BT is resilient in the face of competition but it is a shame that confusion marketing appears to be the solution it has chosen.

2003 Citywire

clearly broadband will become a commodiy



LONDON (AFX) - BT Group PLC said it would cut wholesale prices for its broadband offer from May 1 and easily hit its target to connect 1 mln homes by the summer.
The company also said, due to advances in technology, it can now bring broadband within reach of 90 pct of UK homes, up from its current enabled footprint of 67 pct.

BT recently passed the 800,000 mark for ADSL broadband connections.

The monthly fee for the wholesale consumer product will be reduced by up to 2 stg and there will be even larger savings on BT's wholesale products that are aimed at service providers who serve small businesses, said the company.

Prices for the 500kbs, 1Mbs and 2Mbs products will be slashed by over 50 pct, BT said.

BT's IPStream Home 500 broadband product will cost 13 stg a month, down from 14.75 stg from May 1. There will be no change in connection fees.

BT chief executive Ben Verwaayen said: "These price cuts will benefit everyone from service providers to consumers and businesses and will ensure that the UK continues to have some of the lowest prices in Europe."

The UK government has pledged to make Britain the most extensive and competitive broadband market among G7 countries by 2005.

BT's wholesale arm charges its own internet service provider BT Openworld and other ISPs such as Freeserve from 25 stg upwards per user per month for the use of the line and the technology to operate broadband.

Broadband delivers data at up to 10 times faster than traditional modems. But the UK is still running behind some of its European counterparts in terms of users, especially Germany where some 3 mln homes are connected.

Kick-starting mass market take-up of high speed internet connection forms a central plan of Verwaayen's strategy for BT's growth. tf/slm/

Nomura says they will not be changing numbers as result of announcements on prices but welcomes the moves

WdB has BT ass a buy with price target of 197p

Morten Singleton says expansion of addressable market increases BT's share of BB market

Merrill Lynch is very postive and believes the new pricing package offers significant discount to the new carphone warehouse deal

BT Looks Enticing

By Stuart Watson (TMFTiger)
April 3, 2003


BT Group (LSE: BT.A) has had a busy week. Yesterday it announced a range of price cuts designed to help maintain a 73% share of the residential calls market in the face of increasing competition. For the most part, news of the cuts was well-received by investment pundits.

Today, BT revealed 'technological breakthroughs' would allow it to increase the availability of its broadband services to 90% of UK homes. Its current 'footprint' covers just 67% of the country.

BT reckons it will have 1m broadband customers sometime this summer. It currently has just over 0.8m. At 27 per month, that equates to annual revenues of 325m, less than 2% of BT's total sales. However, with BT serving somewhere in the region of 21m UK households, there is plenty of room for further growth. BT has also reduced its wholesale broadband prices by 2 a month, so this could filter down into lower charges from other providers.

It will be interesting to see the take-up broadband grows over the next few years and how big a market share BT manages to snaffle. The high monthly cost will obviously deter a lot of light dial-up users. Unlike the residential calls market, where our natural apathy means relatively few people will bother to shop around (just 4m have done so to date apparently), broadband is a different kettle of fish. Many people will go with BT for simplicity of course, given that they use them already, but I suspect many more are likely to shop around.

Judging whether BT shares offer decent value is not easy though. It never is when a business is in a recovery stage. You're never quite sure how far profits will rebound. Will the 20%+ profit margins of old be restored? How much growth will broadband bring and how far will it compensate for falling revenues from the residential market?

BT's current market value is 14.5b and it has net debts of just over 10b. At 167p, the shares are valued at around 12 times expected earnings for the year ended 31 March. Results for this period are due to be released on 22 May. The full-year dividend is expected to be between 5.5p and 6p, implying a dividend yield in the region of 3.5%.

At this level, for my money, BT shares are starting to look enticing. They've been overpriced, often hideously so, for the last five years at least. Of course, it wouldn't hurt if they got a little cheaper! Further progress on reducing the debt pile wouldn't go amiss either. This is not a share that is going to set fire to your portfolio, but has a place as a steady performer.

nice move up from 1.55....notice a few more bullish brokers are bringing their targets down to around 2.hard market to call at moment.