EE to continue to offer TV service under own brand

EE will continue to market its recently launched TV service independent of BT as part of the telco’s plan to keep the two brands separate “for the foreseeable future”, according to Guillaume Sampic, head of strategy at EE.

Speaking at an event organised by technology company Netgem on the fringes of this week’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Sampic said that EE is staying as a standalone proposition and that its fixed-line and mobile offerings will continue to be marketed separately as part of a mobile-centric offering – for the foreseeable future. He said that how the different brands would be positioned within BT’s wider offering was still under discussion.

Sampic said that the company is interested in developing live video on-the-go as well as LTE Broadcast and developments such as the ability to live-stream from phones to the set-top box.

“Our strategy has been to focus on the middle ground between pay TV and the Freeview-only market. People are downgrading from pay TV and there are also people upgrading from Freeview,” he said.

EE has the biggest 4G base in the UK with about 14 million subscribers, out of a total mobile base of 27 million. The company has about one million fixed-line customers. EE launched its TV offering in November 2014.