Virgin could expand outside cable by April

Virgin Media could expand outside its cabled area as early as next month.

The company plans to market a quad-play offering comprising broadband internet, TV, fixed-line phone and mobile phone outside its cable addressable area beginning in April.

The television component will be powered by a Virgin-branded digital terrestrial set top box. The channels available on Freeview are broadly comparable, with some absences, to those available in the free TV pack ("size M") offered to Virgin's cable phone line subscribers.

By next year, Virgin plans to have secured network capacity from a local-loop unbundled telephony operator to offer more linear and on demand TV content on a service almost comparable to that available in cabled areas.