Telefónica Europe

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Telefónica Europe plc
legal form plc
ISIN US8793822086
founding 2001
(outsourced from the BT Group )
Seat Slough , Berkshire , United Kingdom
United KingdomUnited Kingdom 
management SpainSpainJosé María Álvarez-Pallete
( CEO and Chairman )
Number of employees 29,000
Branch telecommunications
Website www.telefonica.com/

Telefónica Europe plc has been a subsidiary of the Spanish telephone company Telefónica since 2006 and operates telecommunications services under the brand name O 2 . The company was founded in 2001 under the name mmO 2 by spinning off the mobile communications business of the BT Group and was floated on the stock exchange. In 2006 the company was taken over by the Telefónica Group, since then the entire European business (including landline and Internet) of the Spanish group has been organized in the group, but without the Spanish home market, where Telefónica continues as such, or in mobile communications as Movistar occurs. The German subsidiary, the former VIAG Interkom , operates today as Telefónica Deutschland Holding and Telefónica Germany .

history

The company became independent on November 19, 2001 when the BT Group spun off the shares in its wireless business into a new group, mmO 2 . Shortly thereafter, it undertook a comprehensive brand exchange ("rebranding") of its network operators in Germany ( Viag Interkom ) , Ireland (Esat Digifone) , the United Kingdom (BT Cellnet) and the Netherlands (Telfort) for the O 2 brand . The individual national companies were given the name O 2 (now Telefónica O 2 ), combined with the respective country name in English. The German subsidiary was called Telefónica O 2 Germany .

In 2003 mmO₂ parted ways with O₂ Netherlands , which has been called Telfort again since then, for 25 million euros . After restructuring in March 2005, the company traded as O₂ plc . On January 23, 2006, the Spanish Telefónica completed the takeover of O 2 for the equivalent of 26 billion euros . As a result, O 2 plc and Telefónica, together with over 100 million customers, became the fourth largest mobile communications company in the world after China Mobile , Vodafone and China Unicom .

The formerly state-owned telecommunications group Český Telecom and the affiliated mobile network operator Eurotel , the market leader in the Czech Republic , have also been part of the group since 2006 . Both companies merged on July 1, 2006 to form Telefónica O 2 Czech Republic and at the same time carried out a brand exchange ("rebranding") on the O 2 brand . In June 2006, the British DSL provider Be was bought for the equivalent of around EUR 74 million. The O 2 Group has also had a mobile phone license in Slovakia since August 2006, where it started in February 2007 as Telefónica O 2 Slovakia .

Towards the end of 2009, Telefónica Europe announced the takeover of the Hamburg communications company HanseNet , previously a subsidiary of Telecom Italia . In Germany, the company was known under the Alice brand and served more than 2 million DSL customers. The integration of HanseNet was completed in March 2011.

In April 2011, the change of name from the German subsidiary Telefónica O 2 Germany to the new company Telefónica Germany signaled the solidarity of the global Telefónica Group. The other national companies were successively renamed in the course of 2011. Since then, O 2 has only been the product brand for private and business customers.

On July 23, 2013, Telefonica and KPN announced that E-Plus would be sold for a purchase price of 5 billion euros plus 17.6% of the shares in Telefónica Deutschland Holding . The takeover reduced the number of companies on the German mobile communications market to three.

structure

O₂ phone booth in Prague

Telefónica Europe plc (GB) has three national companies with over 42 million mobile and fixed network customers in Europe.

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