Telecommunications in the United Kingdom have evolved from the early days of the telegraph to modern broadband and mobile phone networks with Internet services.
XS4ALL was an Internet service provider (ISP) in the Netherlands. It was founded in 1993 as an offshoot of the hackers club Hack-Tic by Felipe Rodriquez, Rop Gonggrijp, Paul Jongsma and Cor Bosman, while based in Amsterdam. It was the sixth provider in the Netherlands and the second company to offer Internet access to private individuals. Initially only offering dial-in services via modem and ISDN, it later expanded to offer dial-up access as well as ADSL, VDSL, and fiber-optic (FTTH) services as well as mobile internet. The name is a play on the English pronunciation of access for all.
The Nederlandse Spoorwegen is a Dutch company, the principal passenger railway operator in the Netherlands. Founded in 1938, the NS provides rail services on the Dutch main rail network. The Dutch rail network is the busiest in the European Union, and the third busiest in the world after Switzerland and Japan.
Eircom Limited, trading as Eir, is a large fixed, mobile and broadband telecommunications company in Ireland. The now privatised company, which is currently incorporated in Jersey, traces its origins to the Ireland's former state-owned monopoly telecommunication provider Telecom Éireann and its predecessors, P&T and before the foundation of the state, the telecommunications division of the GPO. It remains the largest telecommunications operator in Ireland and has overseas operations focused on the business and corporate telecom markets in the United Kingdom. The company was in majority state ownership until 1999, when it was privatised through a floatation on the Irish and New York Stock Exchanges.
O2 (typeset as O2) is a global brand name owned by the Spanish telecommunications company Telefónica. The company uses the O2 brand for its subsidiaries in the United Kingdom and Germany. Since 2018 it is also used as an online-only flanker brand in Spain.
KPN is a Dutch landline and mobile telecommunications company. KPN originated from a government-run postal, telegraph and telephone service and is based in Rotterdam, Netherlands.
BT Communications (Ireland) Limited is a telecommunications and internet company in Ireland. It is a subsidiary of BT Group plc.
Mercury Communications was a national telephone company in the United Kingdom, formed in 1981 as a subsidiary of Cable & Wireless, to challenge the then-monopoly of British Telecom (BT). Although it proved only moderately successful at challenging BT's dominance, it led the way for new communication companies to attempt the same.
Albert Heijn is the largest supermarket chain in the Netherlands with a market share of 34.8% in 2020. It was founded in 1887, and has been part of Ahold Delhaize since 2016.
Tiscali S.p.a. is an Italian telecommunications company, based in Cagliari, Sardinia, that provides internet and telecommunications services to its domestic market. It previously had operations in other European nations through its acquisition of many smaller European Internet Service Providers (ISPs) in the late 1990s.
Tele2 AB is a Swedish telecommunications operator headquartered in the Kista Science City, Stockholm, Sweden. It is a major telephone operator in Sweden, Russia, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Tele2 also has a 25% share in T-Mobile Netherlands. As of 7 September 2021, Tele2 and Deutsche Telekom have opted to rid themselves of T-Mobile Netherlands in a sale for an enterprise value of €5.1 billion.
Telenet Group N.V. is the largest provider of cable broadband services in Belgium. Its business comprises the provision of analog and digital cable television, fixed and mobile telephone services, primarily to residential customers in Flanders and Brussels. In addition, Telenet offers services to business customers all across Belgium and in Luxembourg under its brand Telenet Solutions.
Aldi Talk (also known as MEDIONmobile, ALDImobile and HoT Hofer Telekom) is a mobile virtual network operator in Germany, Australia, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Austria and Slovenia. It is a subsidiary of Aldi, the German-based supermarket chain. In Germany, it uses the Telefónica O2 network (since 2014; before, it used E-Plus). In Australia it uses Telstra Wholesale. In the Netherlands, it uses KPN. In Switzerland it uses Sunrise Communications AG. In Austria, it uses Magenta Telekom. In Slovenia, it uses A1 Slovenija.
Lebara Group is a telecommunications company providing services using the mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) business model in the United Kingdom, France, Denmark, the Netherlands and Germany. Lebara provides pay-as-you-go and contract based mobile SIM cards in these countries, and its brand is also used under license in four other countries.
6GMOBILE was a Dutch telecommunications operator that declared bankruptcy in 2012. It combined mobile (GSM), fixed voice and Internet technologies into a single network. It was fully licensed and operational as a GSM operator in the Netherlands.
O₂ UK (legally incorporated as Telefónica UK Limited) is a British telecommunications services provider, headquartered in Slough, England which operates under the O2 brand. It is owned by VMED O₂ UK Limited, a 50:50 joint venture between Telefónica and Liberty Global. O₂ is the UK's largest mobile network operator, with 31.3 million subscribers as of September 2021.
Telefónica Germany GmbH & Co. OHG (German pronunciation: [teləˌfɔnɪkaː ˈdʒœːɐ̯məniː]; also called Telefónica Deutschland[-ˈdɔʏtʃlant]) is a provider of broadband, landline and mobile telecommunications in Germany. The company trades as O2 (typeset as O2).
Winschoten is an unstaffed railway station in Winschoten in the Netherlands. It is located on the Harlingen–Nieuweschans railway between Scheemda and Bad Nieuweschans in the province of Groningen.
Disney XD is a Dutch free-to-air children's television channel owned by The Walt Disney Company. It broadcasts 14 hours a day, time-sharing with Dutch TV station Veronica, and is primarily aimed at children roughly between the ages of 7 and 15. The channel used to have a pay television 24-hour feed that was distributed throughout the Netherlands and Belgium (Flanders); however, it was closed down on 31 July 2018. Viewers in Belgium (Wallonia) and Luxembourg received Disney XD France, until that feed was later shut down in 2020.
Ziggo Holding B.V. is the largest cable operator in the Netherlands, providing digital cable television, Internet, and telephone service to both residential and commercial customers.
