Friday, December 01, 2006

A Pilgrims Progress: Cable & Wireless

As promised we have been keeping a close eye on Cable & Wireless UK operation.

Since the reverse merger with Energis, things seem to have gone pretty well. Certainly the CW people we meet are increasingly chirpy.

As well as showing a notable turnaround in the companies stock market position, they have continued to fare well in the IP Services market and despite some apparent weakness in the web hosting area, they retained their top 3 position amongst the FTSE350 companies and most impressively have experienced no significant churn amongst their largest Internet Access customers.

Bar Chart

The chart above is a unique profile of C&W customers segmented by turnover, based around a normalised or "neutral" axis. As you can see C&Ws profile shows a heavy bias towards major accounts and the upper mid-market. Whilst at the smaller end typically served by business DSL their presence is well below the line.

This striking new data supports the decision by CWs management to sell off their struggling Business DSL business to PIPEX. PIPEXs profile by the way is an absolutely perfect match for that low-end of the market.

Having cast off the burden that was Bulldog, cleared out the first layer of unprofitable customers, CW seem to have made it through the Wicket Gate, but still some way to the Celestial City and BackChannel will be there to keep an eye on "their" Progress.

NB: If anyone would like a free copy of the PIPEX, THUS or Verizon profiles please email steveb"AT"backchannel.co.uk, "AT"=@.
NBB: John Bunyans The Pilgrims Progress is available as a free audio book from Librivox , a really different commuting experience awaits you.
NBBB: We promise no more Pilgrims Progress references