Netvigator is a residential
Internet service provider
An Internet service provider (ISP) is an organization that provides a myriad of services related to accessing, using, managing, or participating in the Internet. ISPs can be organized in various forms, such as commercial, community-owned, no ...
in
Hong Kong
Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...
, operated as a brand of
Hong Kong Telecom
HKT Limited (), also known as Hong Kong Telecom (), is one of the largest telecommunications companies in Hong Kong. It has a dominant position in fixed-line, mobile, IDD and broadband services in Hong Kong. HKT Group is a subsidiary of PCCW ...
, a subsidiary of
PCCW
PCCW Limited (formerly known as Pacific Century CyberWorks Limited) is a Hong Kong–based information and communication technology (ICT) and telecommunications company.
The company is the major owner of telecommunications company HKT Limited, ...
. The company did offer iTV, an interactive movie television network that allowed users to watch movies on their TV screen by demand. The service ended in 2002 (PCCW later re-entered multichannel television market with
IPTV
Internet Protocol television (IPTV), also called TV over broadband, is the service delivery of television over Internet Protocol (IP) networks. Usually sold and run by a Telephone company, telecom provider, it consists of broadcast live telev ...
service
Now TV in 2003).
History
Netvigator dial-up Internet Access Service was first launched under Hong Kong Telecom IMS Limited under the directorship of Dr.
William Lo
William is a masculine given name of Germanic origin. It became popular in England after the Norman conquest in 1066,All Things William"Meaning & Origin of the Name"/ref> and remained so throughout the Middle Ages and into the modern era. It is ...
on 18 April 1996. It acquired another ISP, HKstar, with all the infrastructure and clients, in 1998. Their
broadband
In telecommunications, broadband or high speed is the wide-bandwidth (signal processing), bandwidth data transmission that exploits signals at a wide spread of frequencies or several different simultaneous frequencies, and is used in fast Inter ...
service, under the brand name "Super Netvigator" was launched as a value-added service of the
InteractiveTV (iTV) in May 1998. Subsequently, it launched their standalone broadband service (directly connected to PC without iTV), under the service name "Netvigator 1.5M Ultraline", in July 1999.
United Kingdom operation
Trading initially under the Netvigator brand, with the company name ''UK Broadband'', PCCW entered the UK broadband market with wireless broadband in mid-2004, starting with the
Thames Valley
The Thames Valley is an area in South East England that extends along the River Thames west of London towards Oxford. The area is a major tourist destination and economic hub on the M4 corridor, with a high concentration of technology companies ...
. The brand migrated to Now Broadband during 2005, and the
London
London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
market was opened for business. At the same time the support call centre for the UK was moved from Hong Kong to an outsourcer in the north of
England
England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...
.
In September 2007, Now Broadband sent out letters to selected areas in the UK cancelling the service, citing "limitations not apparent when we launched the service in your area" as the reason for closing certain radio sites.
References
External links
*
UK Broadband (ex-Netvigator) corporate details{{PCCW, state=expanded
Internet service providers of Hong Kong
Former internet service providers of the United Kingdom
Companies established in 1996
Pacific Century Group