The chief executive of Carphone Warehouse, Charles Dunstone, has said that the company is not yet convinced of the merits of buying content to provide a broadband television service.
Speaking to
The Times newspaper, Dunstone said that although the company needs a “bit of a breather” following its acquisition of AOL UK (see
Carphone Warehouse To Acquire AOL UK), he said it would always look at further acquisitions of more broadband customer bases and that providing a broadband service wholesale is not entirely ruled out.
Despite admitting that customer service was the company’s main focus for the meantime, Dunstone admitted that his focus is not just on Britain. He said that the US has “enormous potential” and that there is much growth still up for grabs for the company with markets in France and Spain, where the group already has stores.
“At Carphone we start from the premise that we have to really be able to articulate something to a customer and really make sure people want it and be prepared to pay for it, ” he said.
“I am really not convinced that there is a space for someone like us to provide something like broadband television content.”
Recently the company announced that it had made a £4.6 million loss in the past six months, and had been struggling to cope with the demand for its free broadband service.
The company incurred a £45 million loss in relation to the launch of the service in the six months to the end of September, although excluding this and other one-off costs, profits rose 60% to £59.3 million.
Carphone Warehouse did say that the TalkTalk free broadband launch has been highly successful, with customer take-up well ahead of its expectations (see Free Broadband Leads To Carphone Warehouse Loss).
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