Three UK's owner is reportedly plotting a £9 billion bid for O2

[viridis]

"Telefonica-owned O2 has quietly become the subject of interest from Three UK owner Hutchison Whampoa. According to The Sunday Times, the UK mobile market could quite soon shrink from four major operators to just three, after talks between the two companies reportedly progressed to a point where Hutchison Whampoa is ready to make a £9 billion bid for Britain's second-biggest carrier."

http://www.engadget.com/2015/01/18/hutchison-whampoa-o2-acquisition/

[Toby]

Hi guys,

Yes, Hutchison are in exclusive talks to potentially acquire Telefonica UK. There's more info here: http://o2lin.kr/1BjwE1v

[Cleoriff]

Thanks for that info @Toby  I have been smiling at the new posts...I had no idea posting the BBC link this morning would kickstart all this again....I understand little of it...but read it all with interest

[viridis]

@Toby so how's this pan out for you guys, excited, worried or cannot possibly comment at this time!

[Beenherebefore]

This will be the clincher for Telefonica :

"£10.25bn in cash (approximately €13.5bn)"

[Cleoriff]

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@Beenherebefore wrote:
This will be the clincher for Telefonica :

"£10.25bn in cash (approximately €13.5bn)"

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Indeed...that should bail them out nicely...:smileyhappy:

[viridis]

Wondering if this will give EE a slight upper hand over bt, with O2 being lined up by Hutchison whompa stompa, bt's options have dramatically been reduced to potentially EE or nothing.

[Anonymous]

Gutted if this goes through.  I left Three due to awful customer service - sadly just renewed my O2 contract so I would be locked in for another 23 months - but I'm not going back to three level of customer service!!

[Anonymous]

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@viridis wrote:
Phone fault, not network issue.

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indeed - quite likely; otoh the phone has been checked out twice by Apple and pronounced fault-free. There was a long thread about the problem over on the Apple Products forum, I was not alone so not a one-off phone fault.

[viridis]

No, sounds like a firmware issue that apple will never admit to.

[davethorp]

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@viridis wrote:
Don't need to tether, I use a 3 sim in my tablet and the price of 15 for unlimited data is unrivalled by anyone. And I use that same allowance abroad.

In the grand scheme of things, who would you rather have buy o2?
3 or talk talk?

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Well I'm an EE customer mainly although I do have my iPad sim with 3 (until contract runs out then I'm off to EE) and an O2 sim for a family member. So I'm pretty indifferent about who buys O2 and however as both 3 and O2 have had cause to seriously pee me off in the last 12 months I couldn't wish for a better pairing

I'm just glad 3 aren't buying EE