Virgin Media 2011 Annual Report Download - page 15

Marketing, Sales and Customer Service
Our marketing, sales and customer service initiatives are structured around the differentiated needs of our
retail and wholesale customers. Our retail customer base comprises private and public sector organizations, while
our wholesale customers include primarily mobile and fixed-line service providers, systems integrators, or SIs,
and internet service providers, or ISPs.
Retail Customers
Private Sector
Our private sector retail services focus on a range of the telecommunications needs from small businesses to
large, national corporations. Centralized telephone account managers serve small organizations (with 50 to
99 employees), while regionally-located account, service and project management teams, supported by pre-sales
technical consultants, provide service to medium and large U.K. businesses (with over 100 employees). We
believe that our local presence and the resulting level of service we provide is a key differentiator in this
mid-market segment, and that the benefits of this strategy are reflected in the long term relationships held with
many of our private sector customers.
Public Sector
Our public sector retail services are structured around industry-specific segments, such as local government,
education, health and emergency services. This enables us to provide sector-specific expertise where an
understanding of the drivers and procurement processes of publicly funded organizations are necessary for
efficient deployment of communications solutions. We believe that the inclusion of Virgin Media Business as an
approved supplier under various government framework agreements acts as both an enabler of growth of our
market share in this sector and an endorsement of our track-record, commitment and capability to offer value to
publicly funded organizations.
Wholesale Customers
Our wholesale services are structured around the network requirements of the different types of service
providers. Specialized account and service management teams support carriers, mobile operators, SIs and ISPs.
We provide predominantly data connectivity services, both in terms of local access and core networks, including
high bandwidth connections between a site and the core network.
Our Network
We deliver voice, video and high-speed data services over our access network. The deep fiber design of our
access network enables us to transmit data by means of fiber optic cable from equipment in technical properties
known as “headends” and “hubsites” to widely deployed distribution cabinets. The connection into each home
from the fiber access network comprises two components combined into a single drop cable (twisted copper and
coaxial cable). For video and internet access services, we use the high capacity, two-way, coaxial cable which
has considerable spectrum and associated bandwidth capabilities. This enables us to support a full portfolio of
linear and on-demand TV services as well as high-speed broadband services. Using DOCSIS 3.0 we currently
offer download speeds of up to 50 Mbit/s and 100 Mbit/s. Trials of 300 Mbit/s and 1.5 Gbit/s downstream speeds
have also been conducted. For fixed line voice services, we use a twisted copper-pair. Our relatively short twisted
copper pairs (typically less than 500 meters in length) are also capable of supporting the latest Very High Speed
Digital Subscriber Line 2, or VDSL2, broadband technologies. As a result of the extensive use of fiber in our
access networks, we are also able to provide high-speed data network services to business customers delivering
nationwide connectivity.
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