Enterprise and global customers will continue to do business with BT, but most of BT’s customers will switch to EE from later this year.
Services including BT TV will be operated by the newly enlarged EE. And those with BT Mobile or who take a bundle of services from BT will also migrate to EE. After the changeover, only a small number of BT customers – those who take standalone broadband and landline services – will remain directly with BT.
The restructure is thought to be part of a number of measures being taken to protect BT Group from a hostile takeover.
EE will relaunch with new services and products later this year. At this point, current BT customers will be notified of how their services and billing will change – reassurance has been given to BT customers that “nothing will change”, i.e. they’ll still be served by the same network and continue to receive support from its customer support teams across the UK.
BT’s future split
BT
mainly for businesses
- Enterprise
- Global
- But retaining a limited number of legacy broadband-only and landline customers
EE
for consumers
- Mobile
- Broadband
- Landline
- TV
- Any new innovations / converged products that are developed.
Plusnet
Budget brand for consumers
- No-frills broadband and landline
Additionally, BT Sport is being spun-off into a joint venture with Warner Bros Discovery. Whether it will retain the BT name in the future is yet to be determined. Openreach, BT’s infrastructure company, is unaffected by the changes. Openreach’s remit includes telephone exchange management and fibre roll-out. Its customers are internet service providers, including EE, who use the Openreach network.
Plusnet remains, but with a clearly defined remit of providing a no-frills, simple broadband and landline option to customers. The BT subsidiary has already scaled back activities including Plusnet TV ahead of the changes.
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Explaining how the changes will benefit customers, BT Consumer CEO, Marc Allera said:
“Having both BT and EE in an already crowded consumer market means we must have two of everything, and that makes life harder for our customers and our people – two accounts, two apps, two product roadmaps, and multiple systems. You get the picture. We need to simplify things, for everyone.”