Three Ireland

Three Ireland (Hutchison) Limited
Subsidiary
Industry Mobile telecommunications, Broadband internet access
Founded July 26, 2005 (2005-07-26)
Headquarters 28/29 Sir John Rogerson's Quay, Dublin 2, D02 EY80, Ireland
Area served
 Republic of Ireland
Brands 48 Months [1]
Parent CK Hutchison
Website www.three.ie

Three Ireland (Hutchison) Limited, formerly Hutchison 3G Ireland Ltd and trading as Three (3), is a telecommunications and internet service provider operating in Ireland as a subsidiary of CK Hutchison. The company launched in July 2005 and provides 3G and 4G mobile phone services. Three's former holding company, Hutchison Whampoa, acquired O2 Ireland in June 2013, and the company was fully merged into the operations of Three Ireland in March 2015.

History

A 3 Store, Grafton St, Dublin.

Three launched on 26 July 2005 as Ireland's fourth mobile network operator behind Vodafone, O2 and Meteor. Service was initially offered as post-paid only, but on 16 May 2006 the introduction of a pre-paid service, known as 3Pay, was announced. A pre-paid mobile broadband service was launched on 29 February 2008 under the name 3Pay Broadband, with vouchers available for durations of one day, one week, or one month. On 13 May 2010, Three announced the launch of the world's first commercial voice and data I-HSPA network.

In August 2010, 3 Ireland admitted it has been overstating its subscriber numbers since 2006. As per its latest released mid year statements about 56 per cent of 3's 554,000 registered subscribers are considered active. This is about 244,000 short of the figure supplied to ComReg.[2]

On 24 June 2013, it was announced that Hutchison would acquire Telefónica's Irish mobile operations, O2 for €780 million, to be merged into 3 Ireland upon completion of the deal.[3][4][5] The European Commission approved the merger in 2014. The O2 brand was phased out and its operations fully merged into Three on 2 March 2015.[6]

Network

Three has a licence for operation in Ireland using the access code 083, although numbers can be ported over from other networks.

Three's 3G coverage is made up of a single 2,100 MHz band UMTS network, with claims of 99.5% population coverage [7] and 500,000 subscribers.[8]

As Three's original infrastructure was purely 3G/HSDPA[9] they provide 2G/EDGE coverage (a) under a strategic partnership with Vodafone announced in July 2012,[10] and (b) through the acquisition of O2 Ireland's 2G network in 2015. These have allowed them to concentrate on rapid rollout of their 4G network.

4G

In November 2012, Three was awarded LTE spectrum by auction, along with the three other incumbent network operators.[11]

On 27 January 2014, Three launched their 4G network in Dublin, Cork, Galway, Limerick, Wexford and Waterford.[12] In March 2014, Three expanded their 4G coverage to Ashbourne, Bray, Carlow, Dunmore East, Kilkenny, Leixlip, Lusk, Rush, Skerries, Swords and Tullamore.

In March 2016, Three Ireland announced that it is now offering Free 4G for Life to all its customers. Previously, Three offered free 4G to all its customers up to a certain date at which point the company would review and possibly extend that date further.

4G+/LTE Advanced

Three have announced they will be rolling out 4G+ to their customers offering faster Peak Speeds of 225 Mbps. Three say 4G+ is already available in Dublin and will be rolled out to the rest of the country by the end of April 2016. Three are offering 4G+ to all Customers with compatible handsets.

Sponsorships

On 5 August 2010, 3 Ireland announced a four-year, €7,500,000 deal with the Football Association of Ireland to become the primary sponsor of all Republic of Ireland international football teams.[13]

Following Hutchison Whampoa's acquisition of O2 Ireland, The O2 was renamed the 3Arena in 2014.

See also

References

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