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Spark New Zealand Limited is a New Zealand telecommunications and digital services company providing fixed-line telephone services,
mobile phone A mobile phone or cell phone is a portable telephone that allows users to make and receive calls over a radio frequency link while moving within a designated telephone service area, unlike fixed-location phones ( landline phones). This rad ...
services, broadband, and digital technology services (including cloud, security, digital transformation, and managed services). Its customers range from consumers to small - medium business, government agencies and large enterprise clients. It was formerly known as Telecom New Zealand until it was rebranded to Spark on 8 August 2014. It has operated as a publicly traded company since 1990. Spark's mobile network reaches 98% of New Zealand, with over 2.7 million mobile connections and 687,000 broadband connections Spark is one of the largest companies by value on the
New Zealand Exchange New Zealand's Exchange (), known commonly as the NZX, is the national stock exchange for New Zealand and a publicly owned company. NZX is the parent company of Smartshares, and Wealth Technologies. , the NZX had a total of 179 listed securiti ...
(NZX). As of 2007, it was the 39th largest telecommunications company in the
OECD The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD; , OCDE) is an international organization, intergovernmental organization with 38 member countries, founded in 1961 to stimulate economic progress and international trade, wor ...
. The company is part of New Zealand Telecommunications Forum. Telecom New Zealand was formed in 1987 from a division of the
New Zealand Post Office The New Zealand Post Office (NZPO) was a government department of New Zealand until 1987. It was previously (from 1881 to 1959) named the New Zealand Post and Telegraph Department (NZ P&T). As a government department, the New Zealand Post Office ...
, and
privatised Privatization (rendered privatisation in British English) can mean several different things, most commonly referring to moving something from the public sector into the private sector. It is also sometimes used as a synonym for deregulation wh ...
in 1990. In 2008, Telecom was operationally separated into three divisions under local loop unbundling initiatives by central government – Telecom Retail; Telecom Wholesale; and
Chorus Chorus may refer to: Music * Chorus (song), the part of a song that is repeated several times, usually after each verse * Chorus effect, the perception of similar sounds from multiple sources as a single, richer sound * Chorus form, song in whic ...
, the network infrastructure division. This separation effectively ended any remnants of monopoly that Telecom Retail once had in the market. In 2011 the demerger process was complete, with Telecom and Chorus becoming separate listed companies. Spark has 63 retail locations around New Zealand, including 16 in Auckland.


History

The Postal Services Act 1987 split the then
New Zealand Post Office The New Zealand Post Office (NZPO) was a government department of New Zealand until 1987. It was previously (from 1881 to 1959) named the New Zealand Post and Telegraph Department (NZ P&T). As a government department, the New Zealand Post Office ...
into New Zealand Post Limited (trading as NZPost),
Telecom Corporation of New Zealand Limited Spark New Zealand Limited is a New Zealand telecommunications and digital services company providing fixed-line plain old telephone service, telephone services, mobile phone services, broadband, and digital technology services (including cloud ...
(trading as Telecom) and Post Office Bank Limited (trading as PostBank, sold to ANZ in 1989) and all three industries progressively deregulated. The selling price of Telecom was considered by some to be extremely low, given that Telecom had a
monopoly A monopoly (from Greek language, Greek and ) is a market in which one person or company is the only supplier of a particular good or service. A monopoly is characterized by a lack of economic Competition (economics), competition to produce ...
of all phone lines in New Zealand at the time.


1990s

In 1990, Telecom was sold to two United States–based telecommunications companies, Verizon Communications (formerly Bell Atlantic) and
Ameritech AT&T Teleholdings, Inc., formerly known as Ameritech Corporation (and, before that, American Information Technologies Corporation), was an American telecommunications company that arose out of the 1984 AT&T divestiture. Ameritech was one of the ...
, for NZ$4.25 billion. After Telecom was privatized, the Kiwi Share agreement was drawn up, which included a provision that the company retained free local calling for residential customers. In 1991, Telecom listed on the New Zealand, Australian and New York stock exchanges. The following year Telecom implemented a NZ$200 million fibre-optic cable connection between Australia and New Zealand. Also in 1991, Roderick Deane was appointed CEO of the company. Then in 1993 Ameritech and Bell Atlantic reduced their share in Telecom to a combined 49.6% and BellSouth New Zealand Limited (
BellSouth BellSouth, LLC (stylized as ''BELLSOUTH'' and formerly known as BellSouth Corporation) was an American telecommunications holding company based in Atlanta, Georgia. BellSouth was one of the seven original Regional Bell Operating Companies after ...
), subsequently acquired by
Vodafone Vodafone Group Public Limited Company () is a British Multinational company, multinational telecommunications company. Its registered office and global headquarters are in Newbury, Berkshire, England. It predominantly operates Service (economic ...
, set up the first
mobile network A cellular network or mobile network is a telecommunications network where the link to and from end nodes is wireless and the network is distributed over land areas called ''cells'', each served by at least one fixed-location transceiver (suc ...
to compete with Telecom. Clear Communications reached an agreement with Telecom in 1995 on local service interconnection. Also in 1995, Telecom created First Media Ltd to develop a cable television network across Auckland and Wellington, called First TV. In 1996 Telecom established a
telephone exchange A telephone exchange, telephone switch, or central office is a central component of a telecommunications system in the public switched telephone network (PSTN) or in large enterprises. It facilitates the establishment of communication circuits ...
in the United States for international traffic, and launched Xtra. 1997 saw Telecom buy back NZ$1 billion of its shares. The following year, Ameritech sold down its 24.8% shareholding in an international public offering, and Bell Atlantic issued exchangeable notes that were convertible into the Telecom shares that it owned. In December 1997 Patricia Reddy was appointed to the Telecom board. She remained on it until 2008. In September 2016 as Dame Patsy Reddy she became the Governor General of New Zealand. In 1998, Southern Cross Cables Limited (half owned by Telecom) announced plans to build a fibre-optic cable linking New Zealand with Australia and North America. Vodafone Group bought BellSouth and started a campaign to attract Telecom customers to its network. In 1999, Telecom established a presence in Australia, buying 78% of AAPT, Australia's third-largest telecommunications company. Telecom upgraded its nationwide payphone network to smart card technology. Telecom's broadband Internet service based on
ADSL Asymmetric digital subscriber line (ADSL) is a type of digital subscriber line (DSL) technology, a data communications technology that enables faster data transmission over Copper wire, copper telephone lines than a conventional voiceband modem ...
technology, called
JetStream Jet streams are fast flowing, narrow air currents in the Earth's atmosphere. The main jet streams are located near the altitude of the tropopause and are westerly winds, flowing west to east around the globe. The northern hemisphere and th ...
, was launched and rolled-out progressively in local exchanges. Also at this time, Telecom began charging customers who connected to the Internet using a local dial up number, forcing all ISPs in New Zealand to change to an 0867 dial up number. This resulted in complaints that this was in breach of Telecom's Kiwishare Agreement where residential customers are allowed free local calling. The decade was rounded off with Theresa Gattung being appointed new CEO of Telecom, with Rod Deane moving to the position of chairman.


2000s

In 2000, Xtra signed up its 300,000th customer. Telecom also raised its shareholding in AAPT to 100%. Evidence emerged in early 2002 of Telecom having exploited an ill-considered, or fraudulently made to order, accounting standard (FRS38) to inflate its year 2001 reported profit by some $263 million. This standard required holding companies to incorporate profits and losses of associate companies into their group accounts by way of "equity accounting" except when the associate is insolvent. Being insolvent has been wrongly taken as substantial evidence that the holding company will no longer share in the associates profits and losses. The associate company Southern Cross Cables paid Telecom $263 million in dividends as per (note 2 of) Telecom's 2001 annual accounts, $US200m as per Southern Cross's annual accounts. Southern Cross opened for (limited) business in November 2000 and its income from operations to 30 June 2001 was only $US13 million ($US55 million for the 2002 year). Southern Cross were insolvent to the extent of $US24 million as at 30 June 2000 and this increased to $US280 million as at June 2001 as a result of the dividends and other (net) expenses ($328 million in 2002). The dividends were treated as income in Telecom's accounts there being nothing in FRS 28 to say that they should not be although such inclusion did breach an overall requirement that the accounts present a fair view. In 2003, a new logo was launched. In 2004, Telecom purchased Gen-i Ltd (in May) and Computerland Ltd (in September). The company had 36 retail stores around the country. During the year, the company won the Roger Award for The Worst Transnational Corporation operating in New Zealand. In 2005, Telecom introduced "Bitstream", a 256 kbit ADSL service sold at wholesale prices (at approximately 10% below the retail price) to other ISPs. Telecom also posted a profit of
NZ$ The New Zealand dollar (; currency sign, sign: $; ISO 4217, code: NZD) is the official currency and legal tender of New Zealand, the Cook Islands, Niue, the Ross Dependency, Tokelau, and a British territory, the Pitcairn Islands. Within New Zeal ...
916 million. The company also launched online retail store Ferrit launches with about 150 retailers. ;2006 * 9 May: An audio clip recorded on 2 March was released involving Telecom CEO Theresa Gattung admitting the use of confusion as a chief marketing tool in the industry. The March recording also dismissed the New Zealand Government as "too smart to do anything dumb" with regards to regulation. * Late May: Roderick Deane resigns as chairman, and is replaced by Wayne Boyd the following month. * July: Matt Crockett is appointed CEO of Telecom's newly formed Wholesale division. * All Computerland branches around New Zealand are rebranded as Gen-i. ;2007 * 16 January: The Librarians Association of New Zealand put in a complaint about a Telecom advertisement where 3 young school children state that, "Only dumb kids read books, brainy kids have broadband." Originally Telecom stated that is the views of the young children and not Telecom and the advertisement was unscripted, later that week Telecom choose to edit the advertisement to remove the comments made by the children. * 19 January: It is reported that Paritai Drive,
Ōrākei Ōrākei is a suburb of Auckland city, in the North Island of New Zealand. It is located on a peninsula five kilometres to the east of the city centre, on the shore of the Waitematā Harbour, which lies to the north, and Hobson Bay and Ōr� ...
, one of the richest streets in
Auckland Auckland ( ; ) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. It has an urban population of about It is located in the greater Auckland Region, the area governed by Auckland Council, which includes outlying rural areas and ...
, is still not capable of receiving a
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 ...
SL service and there are many other well populated areas around New Zealand still not capable of receiving broadband. Opposition Woosh Wireless immediately tested their service in the area and gave residents the opportunity to join their wireless broadband service. * 5 February: Telecom announces that from March 2007 they will begin rolling out ADSL2+, more than a year after originally stated for roll out. *31 March: Telecom shuts down its old 025 D-AMPS/TDMA network with all 025 phones changed to 027 (CDMA). *May 2007:
British Telecom BT Group plc (formerly British Telecom) is a British Multinational corporation, multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered in London, England. It has operations in around 180 countries and is the largest provider of fixed-li ...
have been in discussion with the New Zealand government regarding Telecom's monopoly control of the NZ broadband network. Three to four years previously, British Telecom were in a similar position to that which NZ Telecom are now in; the British broadband network has since been broken up and the NZ government are keen to learn and possibly copy the development/regulatory/investment model used by the British firm. *The Auckland Chamber of Commerce publicly stated that if Telecom did not invest in a next-generation high-speed network, comparable with that of other Western nations, they would fund a private fibre-optic based service in the 100 megabit speed range. The proposed coverage of this would be within 200m of a path running south from
Auckland Auckland ( ; ) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. It has an urban population of about It is located in the greater Auckland Region, the area governed by Auckland Council, which includes outlying rural areas and ...
CBD (situated to allow as many businesses as possible to connect). Any company or private individual within this range would be offered a connection. *28 June: Telecom announced that Paul Reynolds, CEO of
BT Wholesale BT Wholesale and Ventures was a division of United Kingdom telecommunications company BT Group that provided voice, broadband, data, hosted communication, managed network and IT services to communications providers (CPs) in Great Britain. It was ...
, has been selected as the new CEO, to start on 27 September. Simon Moutter was appointed as acting CEO in the interim. *30 June: Theresa Gattung steps down as CEO, with a reported leaving payment of $5.125 million. *27 September: Dr Paul Reynolds starts as CEO of Telecom. *In November 2007, the Boost Mobile brand was discontinued in New Zealand by Telecom. *21 November: Mark Ratcliffe, Chief Operating Officer for Technology, is appointed CEO of Telecom's soon-to-be spun off network division. ;2008 *16 January: Telecom announces the formation of Chorus, its new network infrastructure division. *31 March: Telecom officially separates into three divisions (Chorus, Telecom Wholesale, Telecom Retail) *1 April: Russ Houlden, a colleague of Reynolds at BT, is appointed Chief Financial Officer. He replaces Marko Bogoievski, who joined
Infratil Infratil Limited is a New Zealand–based infrastructure investment company. It owns renewable energy, digital infrastructure, airports, and healthcare assets with operations in New Zealand, Australia, Asia, the US and Europe. Infratil was foun ...
. ;2009 *12 January: Telecom announces the closure of its online retail store ''Ferrit''. *August: An industrial dispute emerged between Chorus and the Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union after servicing contracts in the Auckland and Northland regions are awarded to Australian company Visionstream, which planned to change technicians' employment contracts to a dependent contractor model. In October a new logo was announced.


2010s

;2010 *November: Telecom moves into its newly built world HQ on Victoria St in the Auckland CBD. Costing the developer $280 million, it will consist of 2700 staff and be the largest corporate move in New Zealand history. ;2011 *24 May: Crown Fibre Holdings announced that Telecom had been successful in partnering with the Government to build a fibre network. *9 June: The
National Business Review ''National Business Review'' (or ''NBR'') is one of New Zealand's business news publishing websites. The NBR has focused on delivering breaking business news and analysis since its founding in 1970. NBR is known for its independent journalism f ...
reveals that in OIA documents that the Department of Internal Affairs considered at least one text message sent by Telecom to be in breach of the Unsolicited Electronic Messages Act 2007. *1 December: Telecom divests itself of Chorus, the Network Infrastructure division, in a one for five share deal, with Chorus becoming a separately listed company. ;2013 *9 December: Telecom announces sale of AAPT for A$450 million ;2014 *21 February: Telecom announces a name change to 'Spark', which took effect on 8 August 2014 to better reflect the company's new direction and aspirations. *25 June 2014: Spark announce Lightbox, an online movie and TV show streaming service, in competition with
Netflix Netflix is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service. The service primarily distributes original and acquired films and television shows from various genres, and it is available internationally in multiple lang ...
and SkyTV. Lightbox went live on 27 August 2014. *8 August: Telecom rebrands as Spark. Individual subsidiaries of the company are rebranded to reflect the name change such as Telecom Mobile becomes Spark Mobile, Telecom Foundation becomes Spark Foundation, Gen-i is rebranded as Spark Digital. The company kept the existing Star shaped logo with each division using a different colour for the logo such as silver for Spark New Zealand, orange or pink for Spark Home & Mobile stores, green for Spark Business and purple for Spark Digital. *5–7 September: Spark experiences nationwide outages due to a
denial of service In computing, a denial-of-service attack (DoS attack) is a cyberattack in which the perpetrator seeks to make a machine or network resource unavailable to its intended users by temporarily or indefinitely disrupting services of a host co ...
attack, which was believed to have largely originated from malware that installed itself onto customers' computers when they clicked on malicious links to celebrity photos leaked in August. ;2015 * 12 August: Spark released a new cloud based consumer service called Morepork, which offers smart home based security services. This enabled consumers to purchase security hardware and services through a monthly subscription for home monitoring linked to their mobile phone. * 7 December: Spark purchased a
South Island The South Island ( , 'the waters of Pounamu, Greenstone') is the largest of the three major islands of New Zealand by surface area, the others being the smaller but more populous North Island and Stewart Island. It is bordered to the north by ...
–based IT services firm, Computer Concepts Ltd, for $50 million NZD. ;2019 * 14 March: Spark launched its subscription based sports streaming service Spark Sport. The service would compete against Sky Sport (New Zealand) which at the time had a near monopoly on pay TV sports rights in New Zealand. * 19 December: It was announced that Spark would be selling its Lightbox streaming service to the satellite television company Sky Television, which intends to merge Lightbox into its own online streaming service
Neon Neon is a chemical element; it has symbol Ne and atomic number 10. It is the second noble gas in the periodic table. Neon is a colorless, odorless, inert monatomic gas under standard conditions, with approximately two-thirds the density of ...
in 2020. Following the merger, Spark will partner with Sky to make the service available to Spark customers through the telecommunication company's entertainment offers.


2020s

;2023 *4 April: Spark announced that it would invest between NZ$250 million and NZ$300 million into building data centres over the next three years, and between NZ$40 million and NZ$60 million into its 5G business over the next three years.


Mobile network

Telecom started the first cellular network service using AMPS in 1987. This transitioned to D-AMPS TDMA digital services in the early 1990s. The service in the 800 MHz band gave great geographic coverage. In 1996 Telecom introduced an innovative and first-to-market wireless data cellular network known as CDPD (Cellular Digital Packet Data) that provided IP connections with mobility. Introduced to the market by the product manager, David Beale, they succeeded in the very first IoT-device connections in the region connecting, amongst other things, Coke's vending machines, NZ Post's couriers and parcel tracking, and telemetry data from the Americas Cup yacht races in Auckland to feed a realtime TV graphics service. Telecom Mobile, the mobile division of Telecom, reached 500,000 mobile customers connected to its network in 1998, which doubled to one million customers by 2000. In 2005, a
phreaker Phreaking is a slang term coined to describe the activity of a culture of people who study, experiment with, or explore telecommunication systems, such as equipment and systems connected to public telephone networks. The term ''phreak'' is a sen ...
exposed a
vulnerability Vulnerability refers to "the quality or state of being exposed to the possibility of being attacked or harmed, either physically or emotionally." The understanding of social and environmental vulnerability, as a methodological approach, involves ...
with the mobile network, allowing public access to almost anyone's
voicemail A voicemail system (also known as voice message or voice bank) is a computer-based system that allows callers to leave a recorded message when the recipient has been unable (or unwilling) to answer the phone. Calls may be directed to voicemail m ...
; in response to concerns over privacy and security, this network issue was resolved. On 31 March 2007, the 025 D-AMPS ("TDMA") cellular network was closed down. Then on 8 June of that year, Telecom Mobile announced plans to build a hybrid
W-CDMA The Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) is a 3G mobile cellular system for networks based on the GSM standard. UMTS uses wideband code-division multiple access (W-CDMA) radio access technology to offer greater spectral efficiency ...
/
UMTS The Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) is a 3G mobile cellular system for networks based on the GSM standard. UMTS uses Wideband Code Division Multiple Access, wideband code-division multiple access (W-CDMA) radio access technolog ...
-CDMA 850 MHz network, based on the WCDMA HSPA technology, to eventually replace its current CDMA EV-DO network. On 29 May 2009, Telecom launched its new network, branded as "XT", to the public. In December 2009 and February 2010, Telecom's new XT Mobile Network experienced high-profile failures for many customers in locations from Taupo south, due to a radio network controller failure in Christchurch. As a result of the loss of service Telecom offered a $5 million compensation package for its customers. In April 2010, Telecom released its first Android handset on the XT Mobile Network, the LG GW620. On 31 July 2012, the Telecom
CDMA Code-division multiple access (CDMA) is a channel access method used by various radio communication technologies. CDMA is an example of multiple access, where several transmitters can send information simultaneously over a single communicatio ...
mobile network was closed down. In September 2013, Telecom officially launched new Ultra Mobile branding and plans. These plans included a free 4G upgrade (4G was made available two months later in November 2013) with a 1GB of data per day from Telecom WiFi hotspots. In October 2013, Telecom sought clearance to acquire management rights for parts of the 700 MHz spectrum with the intention of developing of its 4G mobile network. Spark New Zealand along with fellow telecommunications companies 2degrees and One New Zealand intend to end their 2G and 3G by 31 December 2025.


Industry regulation and company restructuring

In 2000, the
New Zealand Government The New Zealand Government () is the central government through which political authority is exercised in New Zealand. As in most other parliamentary democracies, the term "Government" refers chiefly to the executive branch, and more specifica ...
conducted a comprehensive review of the regulatory regime in the telecommunications industry. Subsequently, in 2001 the Telecommunications Act was passed, which among other things established the role of a Telecommunications Commissioner. In a decision by the Government on 3 May 2006, Telecom was forced to unbundle the
local loop In telephony, the local loop (also referred to as the local tail, subscriber line, or in the aggregate as the last mile) is the physical link or circuit that connects from the demarcation point of the customer premises to the edge of the co ...
, to provide "access to fast, competitively priced
broadband internet In telecommunications, broadband or high speed is the wide- bandwidth data transmission that exploits signals at a wide spread of frequencies or several different simultaneous frequencies, and is used in fast Internet access. The transmission m ...
". The decision significantly affected the company's market share, and allowed competitors (such as TelstraClear, Orcon and ihug) to offer
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 ...
and other communications services throughout New Zealand by installing their own equipment in exchanges. The announcement of this decision was rushed ahead of schedule, as the documents were leaked to Telecom who advised the government of the leak. It was widely reported that the government had intended to make the announcement during the 2006 Budget. Most of Telecom's competitors and many independent commentators such as InternetNZ and Paul Budde applauded the decision, with opposition to unbundling coming from the Business Roundtable,
Federated Farmers Federated Farmers of New Zealand is a lobby and advocacy group for farmers and rural communities. It has a network of 24 regional organisations and six industry groups. Federated Farmers lobbies on farming issues both nationally and within eac ...
, and Bruce Sheppard (representing Telecom shareholders). Legislation was introduced to enable the regulatory changes. Three other political parties (
New Zealand First New Zealand First (), commonly abbreviated to NZ First or NZF, is a political party in New Zealand, founded and led by Winston Peters, who has served three times as Deputy Prime Minister of New Zealand, deputy prime minister. The party has form ...
, the
Green Party A green party is a formally organized political party based on the principles of green politics, such as environmentalism and social justice. Green party platforms typically embrace Social democracy, social democratic economic policies and fo ...
and
United Future United Future New Zealand, usually known as United Future, was a Centrism, centrist List of political parties in New Zealand, political party in New Zealand. The party was in government between 2005 and 2017, first alongside New Zealand Labou ...
) supported the decision, which would give the government at least 66 votes if there were no votes against the party line. The main opposition National Party initially opposed the unbundling decision, but later voted in favour of it after a select committee hearing. This left the ACT Party alone in opposing the decision. The company was then affected by a series of other government decisions. Firstly, in early-June 2006 the Commerce Commission ruled on the contentious issue of mobile telephone termination charges, announcing that calls between a landline and a mobile phone within a geographically defined boundary could be connected free of termination charges. This ruling allowed Vodafone New Zealand to establish a mobile phone product which could also provide free local calling. Then, the Commerce Commission granted two of Telecom's competitors, CallPlus and ihug, access to an unrestricted, Unbundled Bitstream Service, which would allow them to provide competitive broadband services. On 27 June 2006, the company announced that it would voluntarily separate its business into two separate operating business units – Wholesale and Retail. The Government introduced the Telecommunications Amendment Bill in November 2006 to force Telecom to open its network to competitors. The bill officially split Telecom into three business units from 31 March 2008, with network access separated from the wholesale and retail units. In January 2012 Telecom launched a new Mobile Network aimed at the youth market named Skinny Mobile. On 28 March 2013, Telecom announced that it would reduce staff levels by constraint on recruitment activity and redundancies. This followed from speculation by MP Clare Curran that up to 1500 jobs would be cut from the company.


Spark Broadband

Spark is New Zealand's largest
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 ...
. It was formerly named Xtra. The next largest ISP in the New Zealand market is One NZ, a position it acquired when it purchased TelstraClear in 2012. Spark offers
asymmetric digital subscriber line Asymmetric digital subscriber line (ADSL) is a type of digital subscriber line (DSL) technology, a data communications technology that enables faster data transmission over copper telephone lines than a conventional voiceband modem can provide ...
(ADSL),
very-high-bit-rate digital subscriber line Very high-speed digital subscriber line (VDSL) and very high-speed digital subscriber line 2 (VDSL2) are digital subscriber line (DSL) technologies providing data transmission faster than the earlier standards of asymmetric digital subscriber lin ...
(VDSL), fibre to the premises (FTTP) fixed-line broadband, and Wireless Broadband.


Spark Mobile

Spark NZ is New Zealand's largest
mobile operator A mobile network operator (MNO), also known as a mobile network provider, mobile network carrier, mobile , wireless service provider, wireless carrier, wireless operator, wireless telco, or cellular company, is a telecommunications provider of se ...
by market-share. As of 2021, Spark NZ had 41% of the New Zealand market, beating competitor One NZ (then called Vodafone) who was at 38%. Telecom's mobile network was branded as "XT", and operates at 850 MHz nationwide (with some 2100 MHz overlay in urban areas), and delivers 3G data connectivity wherever there is coverage. Telecom originally operated a TDMA ( AMPS, Digital D-AMPS/ TDMA) mobile network; this was superseded by its
CDMA Code-division multiple access (CDMA) is a channel access method used by various radio communication technologies. CDMA is an example of multiple access, where several transmitters can send information simultaneously over a single communicatio ...
network. The TDMA network was turned off on 31 March 2007, and most of its customers migrated to CDMA. The CDMA EV-DO network was marketed as T3G, a 2 MB third-generation mobile system. Telecom announced on 8 June 2007 the intention to build a
W-CDMA The Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) is a 3G mobile cellular system for networks based on the GSM standard. UMTS uses wideband code-division multiple access (W-CDMA) radio access technology to offer greater spectral efficiency ...
/
UMTS The Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) is a 3G mobile cellular system for networks based on the GSM standard. UMTS uses Wideband Code Division Multiple Access, wideband code-division multiple access (W-CDMA) radio access technolog ...
network, to be called XT Mobile Network, based on WCDMA HSPA technology, to replace its current CDMA EV-DO network. The network was launched on 29 May 2009. The CDMA network ran in parallel with XT until it was shut down on 31 July 2012. The TDMA network used the 025 mobile prefix, using a mixture of six- and seven-digit subscriber numbers. With the switch to CDMA, Telecom migrated to the 027 prefix and standardised the subscriber numbers to seven digits, adding a 4 to the beginning of old six-digit numbers.


Customer numbers and market share

Spark competes with One NZ, 2degrees and mobile virtual network operators for market share. In November 2015, Spark had 2,200,000 mobile customers at 40% market share. In 2021, it was estimated that Spark NZ held a 41% market share in New Zealand. The following shows customer numbers and market share information for Telecom Mobile, covering both the now-shut-down TDMA and CDMA networks and Spark's current 3G, 4G, and 5G networks.


Spark Sport

Spark Sport was a New Zealand sports streaming service, owned and operated by Spark. The service was launched on 14 March 2019 after Spark obtained the New Zealand broadcast rights to various
World Rugby World Rugby is the governing body for the sport of rugby union. World Rugby organises the Rugby World Cup every four years, the sport's most recognised and most profitable competition. It also organises a number of other international competit ...
events including the
2019 Rugby World Cup The 2019 Rugby World Cup () was the ninth edition of the Rugby World Cup, the quadrennial world championship for men's rugby union teams. It was hosted in Japan from 20 September to 2 November in 12 venues all across the country. The opening matc ...
a year earlier. During that time, Spark Sport obtained the rights to several other sports to build its catalog, until the streaming service was ready for launch, coverage was sublicienced to
TVNZ Television New Zealand (, "Te Reo Tātaki" meaning "The Leading Voice"), more commonly referred to as TVNZ, is a New Zealand state-owned media company and Crown entity. The company operates a television network, streaming service, and news se ...
to screen. Its first major live sport broadcast was the streaming of the 2019 Australian F1 Grand Prix. There were concerns that Spark's broadcast of the Rugby World Cup would struggle under New Zealand's internet capabilities especially in rural communities and anticipated audience numbers streaming matches resulting in similar issues to Optus Sport's broadcasting FIFA World Cup 2018 in Australia. On the second day of the Rugby World Cup, Spark Sport suffered technical issues during its live stream of the match between New Zealand and South Africa leaving viewers unable to watch the game, as a result broadcast of the second half was simulcast of traditional television on TVNZ Duke as part of a contingency plan with free-to-air broadcaster
TVNZ Television New Zealand (, "Te Reo Tātaki" meaning "The Leading Voice"), more commonly referred to as TVNZ, is a New Zealand state-owned media company and Crown entity. The company operates a television network, streaming service, and news se ...
for issues during the Rugby World Cup. Viewers would continue to report issues throughout the tournament, despite the issues Spark responded noting that there were no issues from their end in the broadcast feed and that the issues experienced were due to the individual viewer's set up configuration of their streaming devices. Following its broadcast of the 2019 Rugby World Cup, Spark Sport announced it had secured a six-year broadcast deal with
New Zealand Cricket New Zealand Cricket, formerly the New Zealand Cricket Council, is the governing body for professional cricket in New Zealand. Cricket is the most popular and highest profile summer sport in New Zealand. New Zealand Cricket operates the New ...
for all domestic and international cricket played within New Zealand. The rights had been previously held by Sky Sport for over 25 years. Spark Sport's coverage of cricket is presented by Scotty Stevenson, with regular analysts and commentators including Mark Richardson, Craig McMillan, Craig Cumming,
Brendon McCullum Brendon Barrie McCullum (born 27 September 1981) is a former New Zealand cricketer, and the current head coach of the England men's cricket team in all formats. Representing New Zealand, he captained the team in all formats. McCullum was renow ...
, Grant Elliott,
Stephen Fleming Stephen Paul Fleming (born 1 April 1973) is a cricket coach and former captain of the New Zealand national cricket team. He was a left-handed Batting order (cricket), opening batter and an occasional right arm slow medium bowler. He is New Zea ...
, Rebecca Rolls and Frances Mackay. American outside broadcast (OB) provider Gravity Media provided the equipment to cover Spark's coverage, brought over from Australia. This was due to the country's main OB company On Site Broadcasting being owned by Sky Television and had 'Sky Sport' livery on most of its OB trucks. UK's Whisper TV provided the overall production element. During the 2022/23 season
NEP Group NEP Group, Inc. also known as NEP Supershooters LP (formerly NEP Broadcasting LLC) is a Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania based and privately owned international production company that provides outsourced teleproduction services for major events throug ...
was given the outside broadcast contract, which, ironically, bought OSB from Sky in 2020 and all trucks rebranded with NEP livery. Spark Sport was the host broadcaster for the
2021 Rugby World Cup The 2021 Rugby World Cup was the ninth staging of the Rugby World Cup (women), women's Rugby World Cup, as organised by World Rugby. It was held from 8 October to 12 November 2022 in Auckland and Whangārei, New Zealand. It was originally sche ...
held in New Zealand. Spark had previously broadcast sport through its subscription video on-demand service Lightbox partnering with Coliseum Sports Media to deliver a subscription-based sports streaming service called Lightbox Sport streaming golf, English Premier League football and French Top 14 rugby. In December 2022, Spark Sport announced that it would be shutting down in the second half of 2023 due to a combination of financial and technical problems. The remaining three years broadcasting rights for all New Zealand Cricket international and domestic games within New Zealand would go to
TVNZ Television New Zealand (, "Te Reo Tātaki" meaning "The Leading Voice"), more commonly referred to as TVNZ, is a New Zealand state-owned media company and Crown entity. The company operates a television network, streaming service, and news se ...
from 1 July 2023. The
Formula 1 Formula One (F1) is the highest class of worldwide racing for open-wheel single-seater formula Auto racing, racing cars sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). The FIA Formula One World Championship has been one ...
had moved to Sky TV and Sky Sport.


Previously held sports rights

; Rugby union * 2019 Men's Rugby World Cup * 2021 Women's Rugby World Cup * European Rugby Champions Cup *
United Rugby Championship The United Rugby Championship (URC) is an annual rugby union competition involving professional teams from Ireland, Italy, Scotland, South Africa, and Wales. For sponsorship reasons the league is known as the Vodacom United Rugby Championship in ...
*
Manu Samoa The Samoa national rugby union team represents Samoa in men's international rugby union competitions. They are governed by Samoa Rugby Union and also known as "Manu Samoa", which is thought to derive from the name of a Samoan warrior. They perf ...
home games * Ikale Tahi Tonga home games ; Football * 2020 UEFA Euro * 2022 UEFA Women's Euro *
UEFA Nations League The UEFA Nations League is an international European football competition played by the senior men's national teams of the member associations of UEFA, the sport's European governing body. The competition was devised to minimise friendlies a ...
*
UEFA Champions League The UEFA Champions League (UCL) is an annual club association football competition organised by the UEFA, Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) that is contested by List of top-division football clubs in UEFA countries, top-divisio ...
*
UEFA Europa League The UEFA Europa League (UEL), usually known simply as the Europa League, is an annual association football, football club competition organised since 1971 by the UEFA, Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) for eligible European footb ...
*
UEFA Europa Conference League The UEFA Conference League (UECL), usually known simply as the Conference League, is an annual association football, football competition organised since 2021 by the UEFA, Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) for eligible European foot ...
*
UEFA Super Cup The UEFA Super Cup is an annual super cup Association football, football match organised by UEFA and contested by the winners of the two main European club competitions: the UEFA Champions League and UEFA Europa League. The competition's offic ...
*
UEFA Women's Champions League The UEFA Women's Champions League, previously called the UEFA Women's Cup (2001–2009), is a European women's association football competition. It involves the top club teams from countries affiliated with the European governing body UEFA. ...
* 2021 Copa America * 2022 Copa America Femenina *
Copa Libertadores The CONMEBOL Libertadores, also known as Copa Libertadores de América (), is an annual continental club football competition organized by CONMEBOL since 1960. It is the highest level of competition in South American club football. The tournam ...
*
Copa Sudamericana The CONMEBOL Sudamericana, also known as Copa Sudamericana (; ), is an annual international club football competition organized by CONMEBOL, the governing body of football in South America, since 2002. It is the second-most prestigious club com ...
* Recopa CONMEBOL * CONMEBOL World Cup Qualifying *
Premier League The Premier League is a professional association football league in England and the highest level of the English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Football Lea ...
*
Women's Super League The Women's Super League (WSL), also known as the Barclays Women's Super League for sponsorship reasons, and formerly the FA WSL, is a professional association football league and the highest level of women's football in England. Currently oper ...
*
FA Cup The Football Association Challenge Cup, more commonly known as the FA Cup, is an annual Single-elimination tournament, knockout association football, football competition in domestic Football in England, English football. First played during ...
*
FA Community Shield The Football Association Community Shield (formerly the Charity Shield) is Football in England, English football's annual match contested at Wembley Stadium between the champions of the previous Premier League season and the holders of the FA ...
*
EFL Cup The English Football League Cup, often referred to as the League Cup and currently known as the Carabao Cup for sponsorship reasons, is an annual Single-elimination tournament, knockout competition in men's domestic football in England. Orga ...
* Women's FA Cup ; Cricket *
New Zealand Cricket New Zealand Cricket, formerly the New Zealand Cricket Council, is the governing body for professional cricket in New Zealand. Cricket is the most popular and highest profile summer sport in New Zealand. New Zealand Cricket operates the New ...
** Home internationals ** Men's Super Smash and Women's Super Smash ** The Ford Trophy final *
England and Wales Cricket Board The England and Wales Cricket Board, aka ECB, is the Sports governing body, national governing body of cricket in England and Wales. It was formed on 1 January 1997 as a single governing body to combine the roles formerly fulfilled by the Test ...
** Home internationals ** The Hundred ** Vitality Blast ** Royal London One-Day Cup final * Highlights from ICC events. ; Motorsport *
Formula One Formula One (F1) is the highest class of worldwide racing for open-wheel single-seater formula Auto racing, racing cars sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). The FIA Formula One World Championship has been one ...
+ Junior Series (F2, F3) *
World Rally Championship The World Rally Championship (abbreviated as WRC) is an international rallying series owned and governed by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile, FIA. Inaugurated in 1973, it is the oldest FIA world championship after Formula One. E ...
+ Other Series (WRC2, WRC3) *
MotoGP Grand Prix motorcycle racing is the highest class of motorcycle road racing events held on Road racing, road circuits sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de Motocyclisme (FIM). Independent motorcycle racing events have been held sin ...
+ Junior Series (Moto2, Moto3) * DTM *
Porsche Supercup The Porsche Supercup (officially known as Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup, known as Porsche Michelin Supercup prior to 2007 and often abbreviated as PSC) is an international One-design racing, one-make production stock car racing series supporting the ...
* World Rallycross Championship *
EuroFormula Open Championship The Euroformula Open Championship (formerly the Spanish Formula Three Championship, European F3 Open Championship) is a junior formula racing series based in Spain. It was one of six national and international Formula Three championships in Europe ...
*
European Le Mans Series The European Le Mans Series (abbreviated as ELMS) is a European sports car racing endurance series inspired by the 24 Hours of Le Mans race and organized by the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO). The European Le Mans Series is similar to the fo ...
* International GT Open * Toyota Racing Series ; Rugby league *
2021 Men's Rugby League World Cup The 2021 Men's Rugby League World Cup was the 16th Rugby League World Cup, and one of three major tournaments of the 2021 Rugby League World Cup. The tournament was held in England from 15 October 2022 to 19 November 2022. It was originally due ...
* 2021 Women's Rugby League World Cup * 2021 Wheelchair Rugby League World Cup * 2021 Physical Disability Rugby League World Cup ; Hockey * Men's Pro League * Women's Pro League ; Tennis * WTA Tour events excluding events played in New Zealand. ; Other Sports *
Horse racing Horse racing is an equestrian performance activity, typically involving two or more horses ridden by jockeys (or sometimes driven without riders) over a set distance for competition. It is one of the most ancient of all sports, as its bas ...
via TAB Trackside channels *
MLB Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball league composed of 30 teams, divided equally between the National League (baseball), National League (NL) and the American League (AL), with 29 in the United States and 1 in Canada. MLB i ...
* NFL *
NBA The National Basketball Association (NBA) is a professional basketball league in North America composed of 30 teams (29 in the United States and 1 in Canada). The NBA is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United States and Ca ...
via NBA TV * UFC pay-per-view events


Criticism

When Telecom held a general monopoly in New Zealand telecommunications, it was criticised for using its incumbent status to charge high prices. Prices have subsequently dropped as competition in the market has increased. Competitors alleged that Telecom engaged in unfair practices to prevent them from gaining ground, for example by reselling broadband capacity to Xtra at lower prices than to other ISPs. In July 2005, two dozen
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 ...
s formally complained to New Zealand's Commerce Commission via a letter. Notably absent from the list of signatories were Telecom's ISP, Xtra, and several ISPs owned by its main competitor, TelstraClear. On 1 February 2007 the Consumers' Institute gave its "supreme ass award" for bad products to Telecom for its Xtra broadband service, Consumers Institute executive director David Russell claimed that since Telecom "unleashed" its broadband speeds, the institute had been "inundated with complaints of slower speeds and frustrating cutouts". Telecom has been given the Roger Award more than once, in 2004 and 2007 – and only the second company awarded as such, with the defunct TranzRail being the first. The
New Zealand Treasury The New Zealand Treasury () is the central public service department of New Zealand charged with advising the New Zealand Government, Government on economic policy, assisting with improving the performance of Economy of New Zealand, New Zealand' ...
once estimated the economic loss from Telecom's (now former) monopoly to be in the region of $50–$250 million a year. Another study commissioned in 1998 by competitor Clear (later TelstraClear) estimated that the loss was $400 million a year. At a retail level Telecom now faces competition in all areas — cellular, internet, toll-calls and, subject to ongoing developments, in local calling. At a network level these retail services often resell Telecom wholesale products. Telecom claimed one reason for poor broadband uptake in New Zealand was because of the fact New Zealand residential subscribers enjoy free local calling. Telecom stated "customers have the option of moving to faster broadband services, but free local calling creates a disincentive by allowing them to use dial-up for as long they want" (i.e. they do not have to pay a per-minute call charge while using dial-up, unlike many other countries where local calls are charged for). However, some experts and competitors disagreed – including the secretary of the OECD. Telecom failed to reach their self-imposed goal of around 83,333 wholesale broadband customers by the end of 2005. During her opening address to parliament, Prime Minister
Helen Clark Helen Elizabeth Clark (born 26 February 1950) is a New Zealand politician who served as the 37th prime minister of New Zealand from 1999 to 2008 and was the administrator of the United Nations Development Programme from 2009 to 2017. She was ...
criticised the state of the internet in New Zealand. This was followed by extensive criticism in the media such as in two high-profile television programmes, in two episodes of '' Campbell Live'' (whose past major sponsors include Telecom), during which CEO Theresa Gattung was challenged by host John Campbell, and an episode of the New Zealand edition of ''
Sunday Sunday (Latin: ''dies solis'' meaning "day of the sun") is the day of the week between Saturday and Monday. Sunday is a Christian sabbath, day of rest in most Western countries and a part of the Workweek and weekend, weekend. In some Middle Ea ...
''. Critical articles had been published by various magazines and newspapers, including the largest newspaper, ''
The New Zealand Herald ''The New Zealand Herald'' is a daily newspaper published in Auckland, New Zealand, owned by New Zealand Media and Entertainment, and considered a newspaper of record for New Zealand. It has the largest newspaper circulation in New Zealand, ...
''. Of significance, many of these were lengthy and high-profile articles compared to many previous articles critical of Telecom — among the most noticeable of these was published by the ''
National Business Review ''National Business Review'' (or ''NBR'') is one of New Zealand's business news publishing websites. The NBR has focused on delivering breaking business news and analysis since its founding in 1970. NBR is known for its independent journalism f ...
'', in which it was stated that "Far from being 'Xtraordinary', as its multimillion dollar advertising would have you believe, Telecom is strangling the nation's advancement." While in Wellington for an
ICANN The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN ) is a global multistakeholder group and nonprofit organization headquartered in the United States responsible for coordinating the maintenance and procedures of several dat ...
meeting,
Vint Cerf Vinton Gray Cerf (; born June 23, 1943) is an American Internet pioneer and is recognized as one of "the fathers of the Internet", sharing this title with TCP/IP co-developer Robert Kahn. He has received honorary degrees and awards that inclu ...
was reported to have made a personal visit to
David Cunliffe David Richard Cunliffe (born 30 April 1963) is a New Zealand management consultant and former politician who was Leader of the New Zealand Labour Party and Leader of the Opposition (New Zealand), Leader of the Opposition from September 2013 to ...
, the telecommunications minister where it is believed he recommended that Telecom be unbundled. The government investigated whether it needed to force Telecom to unbundle the network, thereby allowing other companies access and improving broadband service for consumers. From 2007, Yahoo! provided Telecom's email service, which came under heavy criticism in early 2013 following a spam and phishing attack described as the biggest to have ever hit the country. Telecom and Yahoo! automatically reset tens of thousands of users' passwords. In April, Telecom announced that despite the issue, it would keep Yahoo! on as an email provider. Problems with Telecom's YahooXtra email continued into December 2013 and further into 2014 with the latest problems reported on 10 January. They later moved their mail service to SMX, a New Zealand-based provider, in May 2017.


References


External links

* {{Authority control Companies based in Auckland Companies listed on the Australian Securities Exchange Companies listed on the New Zealand Exchange Companies in the S&P/NZX 50 Index Consumer electronics retailers of New Zealand Cross-listed companies Mobile phone companies of New Zealand Privatisation in New Zealand Telecommunications companies established in 1987 Telecommunications companies of New Zealand New Zealand companies established in 1987