Telecom

BT Group plc (formerly British Telecommunications plc) which trades as BT (and previously as British Telecom) is the privatised UK state telecommunications operator. It is the dominant fixed line telecommunications provider in the United Kingdom. more...

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BT operates in more than 170 countries and almost a third of its revenue now comes from its Global Services division.

Businesses

BT runs the telephone exchanges, trunk network and local loop connections for the vast majority of British fixed-line telephones. Currently BT is responsible for approximately 25 million telephone lines in the UK. Apart from Kingston Communications, which serves Kingston-upon-Hull, BT is the only UK telecoms operator to have a Universal Service Obligation (USO) which means it must provide a fixed telephone line to any address in the UK. It is also obliged to provide public call boxes.

BT's businesses are operated under special government regulation by the British telecoms regulator Ofcom (formerly Oftel). BT has been found to have Significant Market Power in some markets following Market Reviews by Ofcom. In these markets, BT is required to comply with additional obligations such as meeting reasonable requests to supply services and not to discriminate.

As well as continuing to provide service in those traditional areas in which BT has an obligation to provide services or is closely regulated, BT has expanded into more profitable products and services where there is less regulation. These are principally, broadband internet service and bespoke solutions in telecommunications and information technology.

BT Group is organised into the following business divisions:

BT Retail: Retail telecoms to consumers; BT Wholesale: Wholesale telecoms core trunk network; Openreach: fenced-off wholesale division, tasked with ensuring that all rival operators have equality of access to BT's own local network; BT Global Services: Business services and solutions (formerly BT Ignite and BT Syntegra); BT Exact / One IT: consultancy and internal IT. There is some overlap with BT Global Services. R&D functions are no longer handled by BT Exact.; Group operations: handles security, research and development, and other functions for BT Group Plc such as legal services;

History of BT

Official BT history page

A number of privately owned telegraph companies operated in Britain from 1846 onwards. Among them were

The Electric Telegraph Company,; British and Irish Magnetic Telegraph Company,; British Telegraph Company,; London District Telegraph Company,; and the United Kingdom Telegraph Company;

The Telegraph Act of 1868 passed the control of all these to the newly formed GPO (General Post Office)'s "Postal Telegraphs Department"

Read more at Wikipedia.org