Virgin Media has inflated its budget phone family by introducing a new pocket-friendly mobile phone, dubbed the Alcatel VM202. The phone is exclusive to Virgin Media.

Regardless of its bottom-end £29.99 price tag, the VM202 phone come equipped with a number of high-end features such as a slide out QWERTY keyboard, MP3 player with MP4 video playback, FM radio, VGA camera, a
3.5mm audio jack and a 1GB microSD card. Opera Mini is there for web browsing.

Virgin Media has claimed of posting a sound quarter fiscal figures for 2010.

It has been added that whilst at the quarter end of June 30th, the company proclaimed of having total revenue up to £964 million, which supposedly is close to nearing the distance of the billion mark.

The figure has been upped by 7.1% and stated it to be one of the strongest growth in four years, where the company has chalked out the performance reports for its mobile and business divisions.

Virgin at the same time has posted an operating income that soared from £9 million to £80 million.

The deal that saw cable provider Virgin Media sold to rival satellite broadcaster BSkyB, is being closely viewed upon by the Office of Fair Trading (OFT).

The TV channel deal is something of concern as OFT involvement might spark the rumors of something fishy going around or may be to stop the deal, which in actual is not the case.

Virgin Media has stated that it is aiming to reclaim £375 million shares over the coming year.

It is supposedly a move that has been initiated soon after the company added 9,100 customers to its clientele in the Q2 last year, at the same time Virgin media posted a loss of 27,800 customers in the same period.

It was Virgin Media CEO Neil Berkett who added that the reclamation of shares is a part of the £700 million capital return program in which the company will aim at covering its debt amounts.

Virgin Media has proclaimed of its plans to release a web based video on demand service known as Virgin Media Player.

Company officials claim that the service will be offered for the members of its Virgin Media XL TV package with Virgin Media broadband users.

The only hitch attached is one can have an access to the service for only an hour each day.

The company adds that the PC version will be having channels proffered by ITV, Disney, National Geographic, Comedy Central, MTV, National Geographic, Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon.

Internet service provider Virgin Media will make use of electricity poles belonging to Western Power Distribution, in partnership with Surf Telecoms to provide village communities of Crumlin and Caerphilly with broadband speeds of 50Mbps.

Virgin Media sees the use of electricity poles as a good alternative to stringing broadband cable alongside telecoms giant BT's copper pipes. The company believes that using the pylons for the installation of fibre optic cables is much easier and cheaper than installing the cables via BT's underground cable network.

Virgin Media plans to take a step against the likes of Ofcom.

The progress made in favour of the release of the multi channel backed online TV platform Project Canvas, will be hampered by the cable TV provider Virgin Media who continues to have a grudge and wouldn't mind lodging a complaint against the controller Ofcom.

And project Canvas is termed as an anti competitive step as understood by Virgin media.

The ant-competitive nature is said to be the basis of the firm's argument against the scheme, which has received a nod by the BBC Trust.

Virgin Media soon plans to add One HD channels starting today.

The broadcaster plans to adjoin Fiver, Fiver +1, Five USA & Five USA +1 with the two time shifted channels Five now comes with five channels on the Virgin media platform and claims to have extended its number of HD channels to 13 in all.

It was further stated that an additional 20 channels will be added which will include channels such as Sky Sports and Sky Movies.

Broadband provider Virgin Media launched a new scheme, called The 10 Things Project, on 6th of June to celebrate the tenth anniversary of company’s broadband services.

The Project, which was created by branding & digital agency Start Creative, has been calling web users to nominate their favourite moments or things that they have seen on the internet over the last ten years.

Project Canvas, the successor of the now-defunct Project Kangaroo, has faced opposition from the Virgin Media, though it has already obtained approval from the Office of Fair Trade and the BBC's self-regulatory body, the BBC Trust.

Project Canvas, a joint venture among the BBC, Five, ITV, Channel 4, BT and TalkTalk, has an aim to bring internet TV to the living room.

Project Canvas’ Director Richard Halton expressed delight at trust's decision to approve the project and said they expected to bring video-on-demand to Freeview and Freesat sometime during the next spring.

Cable giant Virgin Media has announced that it would provide its customers with a speedier 400Mbps broadband service no too distant in the future.

Virgin Media said that it was already working on a new and improved modem, which would be able to handle speeds of up to 400Mbps.

However, the firm didn't announce further details on the product.

Virgin Media is yet to release its 100Mbps broadband service due at the end of the year, and it is still trialing its 200 Mbps broadband product.

Sky and Virgin Media have been placed at the top position in a study of customer reliability and experience.

Satmetrix surveyed 8,700 Brits, who had bought products or services from companies including BT, Orange, Sky, TalkTalk and Virgin Media.

Virgin Media’s existing as well as new customers will be able to enjoy Sky's premium sport and movies channels at lower prices.

The subscription fees for Sky’s premium channels including Sky Sports and Sky Movies will be slashed from 1st of July. Customers opting for the M+, L or XL TV packages will be able to add a single Sky Sports channel or a Sky Movies channel for £13.50 a month that represents a saving of up to £9. The entire Sky Sports Collection, which includes Sky Sports 1, 2, 3 and 4, will be offered for £20.50 a month, saving £42 a year for customers.

Virgin Media is the only major network provider in the UK that hasn’t announced any plans to sell Apple’s newly unveiled iPhone 4.

The iPhone 4 is just two weeks away from its UK launch and five major mobile phone operators viz. T-Mobile, O2, Vodafone and Orange and ‘3’ have already confirmed that they would sell much-anticipated iPhone 4 smartphone.

Network provider ‘3’ has recently announced that customers would be able to pre-order iPhone 4 starting Tuesday, June 15th. However, none of the operators has announced the details of prices and tariffs for the upcoming phone.

The TV and online media giant Virgin Media has announced that it would increase its marketing spend by 30 per cent this year to approximately £170 million as compared with £132.8 million last year.

Virgin Media has already started multi-million advertising campaign for its HD services. It is posting ads through TV, print, internet and cinema to promote its services.

The firm has plans to make HD contents available via its on-demand service, which has reported a record number of users in the first quarter of current year.