NEWS IN BRIEF
Daily Digest 8 December
08-12-2009
by Sylvia Leatham
Smart to exit examinership | Magnet challenges UPC broadband claim
UK broadband provider TalkTalk, which is owned by Carphone Warehouse, is to create 60 new jobs at its Waterford customer contact centre. The company said it was immediately seeking 50 full-time and 10 part-time staff, to add to its existing base of 700 people at the facility. The news follows a recent announcement by Carphone Warehouse that it plans to close its Tiscali call centre in Sligo next year, with the loss of 160 jobs. Some of those jobs will transfer to Waterford, but are not included in the jobs announced on Tuesday. TalkTalk (formerly known as AOL Broadband) offers home phone and broadband packages to the UK market. The Waterford contact centre manages customer support for all TalkTalk and AOL UK customers.
Irish broadband and telecoms provider Smart Telecom has announced that it is to exit examinership on 11 December. Smart entered the examinership process in August with a view to restructuring its balance sheet and securing a strategic investment. The High Court has now approved a range of proposals that will allow Smart to exit examinership, including a restructuring of its balance sheet and the acquisition of the company's residential customer base and assets by Digiweb. In a statement, Smart said the combined companies have annual revenue approaching EUR40 million and over 150 employees. Smart will become part of the Digiweb Group but retain its own brand in the communications market. Smart employees will move to Digiweb's Blanchardstown offices in December.
In other broadband news, Irish provider Magnet has taken rival UPC to task over its claim to have the fastest consumer broadband product on the market, following the launch of the latter's 30Mbps 'Fibre Power' product on Monday. Apart from pointing out that Magnet has already launched a 50Mbps consumer broadband package, Magnet also takes issue with UPC's use of the term "fibre powered" to describe its product. "Terms such as 'fibre powered' give the perception that customers are getting fibre all the way to their homes. In reality UPC's connection from the street cabinet to the home is not fibre but coaxial," said Magnet Networks CEO Mark Kellett. "Fibre is like a massive water main. With cable broadband your house connects to that main with its own smaller pipe. With our fibre service we're bringing the water main right into your house giving you the full tsunami of the internet as opposed to a trickle," he added.
A new website that claims to provide independent advice on financial products has been set up by Kildare-based financial consultant Bob Quinn. Quinn says Myrecession.ie "gives people a chance to make intelligent comparisons with the vast array of financial products, particularly in the area of savings and pensions". Quinn says the company has no allegiance to any insurance company, bank or financial institution but will source products on behalf of clients.
Denis O'Brien's Caribbean mobile operator Digicel has announced that it has completed a USD500 million corporate bond offering of senior notes, due 2017. The proceeds of the offering will be used to repurchase Digicel's outstanding USD450 million senior notes, due 2012, in a tender offer or through redemption, with any balance retained by the company for general corporate purposes. The offering was led by Credit Suisse, with Citi and JP Morgan acting as joint bookrunners on the deal.
Videogames developer PopCap Games is launching a version of its puzzle game Chuzzle for the iPhone and iPod touch. The game is available now from Apple's App Store. PopCap is based in Seattle with a number of offices around the world, including in Dublin.
Internet giant Yahoo has launched a campaign designed to "inspire a ripple of kindness around the world". The 'kindness campaign' is an extension of Yahoo's existing 'Purple Acts of Kindness' programme. Yahoo says it is encouraging people to "give back through random acts of kindness during the holiday season". People who want to participate can visit Kindness.yahoo.com and post online status messages there describing their good deeds. Users can also share their status updates via social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter.
Caped Koala Studios has built a virtual world for kids, combining education and social networking 