Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to Liberty Global's first quarter 2026 investor call. This call and the associated webcast are the property of Liberty Global, and any redistribution, retransmission, or rebroadcast of this call or webcast in any form without the express written consent of Liberty Global is strictly prohibited. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. Today's formal presentation materials can be found under the Investor Relations section of Liberty Global's website at libertyglobal.com. After today's formal presentation, instructions will be given for a question-and-answer session. Page 2 of the slides details the company's safe harbor statement regarding forward-looking statements.
Today's presentation may include forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, including the company's expectations with respect to its outlook and future growth prospects and other information and statements that are not historical fact. These forward-looking statements involve certain risks that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by these statements. These risks include those detailed in Liberty Global's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including its most recently filed Forms 10-Q and 10-K as amended. Liberty Global disclaims any obligation to update any of these forward-looking statements to reflect any change in its expectation or in the conditions on which any such statement is based. I would now like to turn the call over to Mr. Mike Fries.
All right. Thanks, operator. Hello, everyone. Appreciate you joining the call today. As usual, Charlie and I will handle the prepared remarks and the presentation, and then I have my core leadership team on the call with me and on standby for Q&A as needed. We've got a lot of ground to cover, so I'm just gonna jump right in on the first slide, which provides some key takeaways from the quarter. To begin with, we delivered strong operational performance, and we'll go through it all in a moment. One big headline here, this was our fourth straight quarter of steady broadband improvement across each of our big three markets, with fixed to mobile ARPUs remaining largely stable. Charlie will walk through how this translates into our financial results, but the punchline is we will be confirming all of our 2026 guidance today.
There are lots of reasons for this commercial momentum, including our multi-brand strategies, our network investments, AI implementations around personalization and churn in call centers. We'll talk about all that a bit today, but really what we'll do on our second quarter call is do a deeper dive on our AI initiatives, so stay tuned for that. Equally important for this audience is the fact that we are making real progress on the value unlock initiatives announced this past February. The acquisition of Vodafone's 50% stake in our Dutch JV is on track to close this summer, and we see no obstacles to getting that deal done on time. That, of course, is just one of the main building blocks underlying our strategy to spin off our Benelux assets in the second half of next year.
I'll walk you through each of those building blocks in just a moment, as well as the value we could and should create for you all by spinning off the Ziggo Group. Quickly on Netomnia, that transaction in the U.K. is now officially in the regulatory process, and while the noise from one or 2 competitors has escalated recently, we're pretty confident this deal will be approved. It's a very positive development for the U.K. fiber market, which is in desperate need of rationalization, as you all know. It's a great outcome for VMO2, for all the reasons we reviewed on the last call. Finally, you won't be surprised to hear that we are highly focused on capital allocation at the corporate level. Over the last 2 years, we've brought our net corporate cost down by 75%.
We talked about that on the last call. We've articulated what we believe is a clear investment strategy around telecom and growth, and we've strengthened our balance sheet. After funding the EUR 1.2 billion needed to close the Vodafone transaction and executing on around EUR 700 million of asset sales from our growth portfolio, we should end the year with around EUR 1.5 billion of corporate cash. As noted here on the slide, through April, we generated around EUR 300 million in proceeds, so we're sort of on our way. Finally, just one quick remark on the broader telecom environment in Europe. As you would know, the sector has performed well in the last 12 months or so. That's driven in part by improved operational performance, reduced CapEx, and a general rotation out of software and into industrials.
You're all familiar with those trends. I would add to the list what appears to be an improving regulatory climate in Europe when it comes to telecom broadly and more specifically when it comes to consolidation. We await the formal release of the EU merger guidelines, for example, but these changes are expected to redefine the rules, and that's going to be a big positive together with an increasing commitment to sovereignty to our sector and the broader telecom industry. I am sure you're aware of that, but important to note. Moving on to the next slide. Let me start by saying that there will come a point in time when I don't need to put this chart in the deck.
For now, I think it's helpful to summarize our operating structure, specifically our three core pillars of value creation, Liberty Telecom, Liberty Growth, in the center, Liberty Global itself, and to highlight the strategies we're executing to create and deliver that value. Liberty Growth on the far right houses our portfolio of media infra and tech investments totaling EUR 3.4 billion today. Here we're focused on rotating capital, investing in high-growth sectors with scale and tailwinds. We'll try to spotlight a few of those in each quarter, today we'll lay out the thesis for the experience economy. In the center sits Liberty Global itself, with EUR 1.9 billion of cash and a team with decades of experience operating and investing in these businesses.
As we reported last quarter, we've restructured our operating model and reduced net corporate cost by 75% since 2024 to around $50 million this year. These two asset pools alone, by the way, our cash and the market value of our growth investments exceed the current price of our stock by around 30%, which means, of course, that everything in our core Liberty Telecom business on the left, namely $22 billion of revenue, $8 billion of EBITDA, and 4 incredible converged telecom champions, are receiving no value at all in our stock. In fact, negative value if you give us credit for our substantial reduction in corporate cost. As we said over and over and over, our primary goal here in telecom is to drive commercial momentum and importantly, to unlock value for shareholders.
That was the impetus behind our Sunrise spin-off, which you all know about, and which we believe has worked extremely well for investors. That's why in the last call, we described the formation of the Ziggo Group, combination of our Benelux assets in Holland and Belgium, and our intention to spin off our interest tax-free to shareholders in the second half of 2027. Where are we on that specific initiative? I referenced earlier the building blocks that form the foundation of our expected value unlock with the Ziggo Group, and you can see the most significant ones outlined on the left-hand side of the next slide. Let me just say that each of these steps, each of these blocks if you will, are centered around strategic catalysts, free cash flow growth, and deleveraging. They each represent a foundational element of the value creation plan here.
This is the primary blueprint we've been executing, of course, with dozens of overlays and work streams, but it should give you greater confidence and awareness of our plans here. Let's start with Belgium. The first step was, of course, separating Telenet from its fixed network, which is now a 2/3, 1/3 JV called Wyre. This restructuring accomplishes or has accomplished 4 key things. First, it isolates a significant fiber CapEx and debt capital needed to upgrade the HFC network in Flanders into an off-balance sheet vehicle. Second, it precipitated a comprehensive network cooperation agreement between Wyre and Telenet on one hand, and Proximus and its fiber asset, Fiberklaar, on the other hand, which I'm pleased to say was just signed yesterday and will result in a single network, ours or theirs, in about 75% of Flanders. That's a great outcome.
It creates a cleaner, more consumer and B2B-focused Telenet ServCo with a significant free cash flow turnaround story supported by declining mobile CapEx and mostly AI-driven OpEx reductions. Fourth, it facilitates a reduction in Telenet's leverage from both the rebalancing of debt between Wyre and Telenet and the sale of a portion of our stake in Wyre at a premium, by the way, which will be used to repay debt at Telenet. Really critical steps to getting where we want to be. Moving to the Netherlands, for me, the first strategic catalyst here was bringing in a new management team, one that could set the tone for a return to growth and for winning results in the Dutch market. Steve and his team have delivered exactly that.
The second strategic catalyst was, of course, reaching an agreement with Vodafone to buy their 50% stake in our Dutch JV. This deal, as I just said, is scheduled to close in less than 3 months. Not only is that deal accretive from a financial point of view, but it strategically unlocks about EUR 1 billion in synergies we referenced and provides the structural elements necessary to complete a tax-free spin-off next year. Each of these steps accelerates our commitment to reducing leverage at VodafoneZiggo, which we'll accomplish through asset sales, a return to EBITDA free cash flow growth, and synergies. On the top right of this slide, you can see a side-by-side of Sunrise and the combined Ziggo Group. If you look at 2025, the Ziggo Group is bigger.
It's about 2 to 2.5 times larger in revenue and EBITDA and a bit more profitable. Importantly, you'll see that in 2028, we're estimating free cash flow of around EUR 500 million and leverage of 4.5 times, which, you know, presents a comparable financial profile to Sunrise when we spun it off in Q4 2024. On the chart on the bottom right provides an illustrative bridge to the EUR 500 million of free cash flow, which is estimated to be EUR 120 million this year. The biggest components of that, as you can see, are the non-recurring nature of some costs this year in Holland, combined synergies, Telenet's mobile CapEx reduction, and organic EBITDA growth. We think the Ziggo Group represents a compelling equity story, and it's anchored around 4 selling points.
Number 1, this is a strong regional business with two of Europe's most rational telecom markets that are best-in-class brands. Number 2, we have clear network strategies here with declining CapEx as 5G investments subside and fiber costs are moved off balance sheet in Belgium and a cost-efficient DOCSIS 4 rollout in Holland. Declining CapEx and great visibility to the network strategies. Number 3, rising free cash flow and declining leverage. That's supported by organic growth, synergies, and EUR 1.2 billion-EUR 1.4 billion of local asset sales I've already described, towers, property, et cetera. Number 4, a commitment to pay dividends from free cash flow as we've done with Sunrise. We have lots of work to do, but this plan and this path forward is clear for us, and we look forward to updating you each quarter on our progress.
What does it all add up to? I'm sure many of you are wondering, you know, what sort of value creation do we think is achievable here? The chart on the next slide is actually simpler than it looks, it moves left to right, it demonstrates how we have and how we intend to create value through this unlock strategy. Let's start on the far left. The day we announced our intention to spin off Sunrise in February 2024, our stock closed at $18. Of course, 9 months later, we completed the spin-off and using Sunrise's current stock price, we feel we delivered a tax-free dividend that's valued today at $13 per Liberty share. Together with our $12 stock, you get to $25 or about a 40% value appreciation in the last 14 months or so.
Far so good. About 2 months ago, we announced the second step in our value unlock strategy with our intention to consolidate Benelux and spin off the Ziggo Group in the second half of next year. What might that be worth? These numbers are illustrative. Lawyers maybe say that, of course. If you move to the right to the third column, I think you'll see the answer. We believe a publicly listed Ziggo Group, if it were to trade at, let's say, the same implicit valuation of Sunrise today in essentially an 11.5% free cash flow yield, could be worth up to $14 per Liberty share based upon the 2028 free cash flow estimate of EUR 500 million that we just discussed. Without debating the point, we believe this could be conservative.
As you would know, many of our peers, KPN, Swisscom, Orange, Zegona, they trade at free cash flow yields of 5%-7%, albeit with different leverage profiles. Let's stick with the 11.5% free cash flow yield. The primary question is where will Liberty itself trade post-spin? Remember, we believe that the entire Liberty Telecom group has negative value in our stock today of around $4 per share, despite our announced intentions regarding Ziggo. With our cash and growth assets worth $16 and our stock at $12, that's the only conclusion we can reach. To arrive at $14 post the Ziggo Group spin, we simply added our pro forma cash balance after the Vodafone deal and asset sales together with the value of our remaining growth assets, including our residual stake in Wyre, and we get to $14.
By the way, these numbers assume that the market continues to assign no equity value. That's 0 equity value to our remaining telecom businesses in the U.K. and Ireland. Of course, we think there's substantial equity value in these businesses, but we don't need to agree on that to get to these numbers. To recap, if you follow the light blue boxes from February 24, the day we announced our plans to spin off Sunrise to today, we created $7 on what was an $18 stock. That's 40%. We believe for those who had held on to the Liberty stock and their Sunrise stock, that number gets to 41 with the Ziggo Group spin.
If you do the same thing with the dark blue boxes for those who bought their shares after the Sunrise spin-off, we think we can take $12 today to as much as $28 by the second half of next year when we spin the Ziggo Group. Now, while there are no sure things in life and plenty to do between now and then, trust me, the building blocks we think are in place and we feel good about the plans and these estimates here. Now, one of the reasons for that good feeling is the progress Stephen and his team have made over the last five quarters.
This next slide summarizes some of those initiatives and some of the progress beginning early last year when we repositioned broadband pricing, changed the operating model and rejuvenated our campaigns, even expanded our footprint through the deal with Delta Fiber. As a result of that, we saw steady improvements right away in broadband, where we'd been losing over 30,000 subscribers every quarter. Those changes continued into 2026 when we rejuvenated the Ziggo brand with a new campaign, the Everything Network, that was supported by our UEFA rights, by the way, which we just extended. We also launched broadband into our no-frills flanker brand, bringing a simple and value-driven connectivity product to that critical segment. You can see at the bottom right, the broadband net adds have been moving in the right direction for 4 straight quarters.
In fact, our Q1 result was the best in 3 years, driven by all the initiatives I just referenced, pricing adjustments, new campaigns, product expansion, network improvements. By the way, we have the largest reach of 2 gig broadband services in the country. We just launched field trials with DOCSIS 4 in anticipation of launching 4 and 8 gig products later this year. Operationally, VodafoneZiggo is in great shape and improving exactly what you want to see as we plan for a public listing next year. The next 2 slides summarize Q1 operating performance across our 4 markets. I'm going to do this quickly since the CEOs are on the call and they can provide color if needed. I think the main headline here is that we continue to see good broadband trends pretty much across the board and stable fixed and mobile ARPUs.
Starting with VodafoneZiggo, like I just talked about, our broadband performance improved for the fourth consecutive quarter and postpaid mobile net adds also improved sequentially. We continue to invest in our fixed mobile markets in Holland with both the Vodafone and Ziggo networks receiving outstanding awards in the Umlaut test. With ARPUs of nearly EUR 57 in fixed and EUR 18 in mobile staying steady, it's been a good outcome. Turning to Belgium, Telenet delivered its highest quarterly broadband result in 10 years, driven by successful cross-sell campaigns and strong performance with our BASE, our flanker brand there. Postpaid mobile results remain subdued in Belgium as the market's pretty competitive. Here too, our BASE brand is outperforming, while both mobile ARPU at EUR 16 and fixed ARPU at EUR 63 remain largely stable ahead of upcoming price adjustments in Q2.
Now turning to the U.K. on the next slide, despite a market that remains highly competitive, Virgin Media O2 delivered a third straight quarter of broadband improvement with just 6,000 losses compared to 43,000 losses a year ago. This was supported by strong commercial and retention initiatives and of course, lower churn. Importantly, and despite pressure on the overall market pricing, here our fixed ARPU remained relatively stable at GBP 46.50, supported by more and more personalized and AI-driven pricing. With the Netomnia deal working its way through the regulatory process, we continue our fiber to the home expansion with 8.7 million fiber homes available today. In U.K. Mobile, we launched O2 Satellite. You might have seen that making us the first operator in the U.K. to switch on direct-to-device satellite connectivity.
In addition, our mobile network transformation is progressing with new RAN upgrade agreements and the transfer of the second tranche of spectrum from Vodafone Three. That's hugely important to us. O2 now has the largest 5G standalone footprint in the U.K. Net postpaid losses of 60,000 were materially better than last quarter as churn from the Q4 price adjustment, we've talked about that, subsided and ARPU of around GBP 17 was broadly stable. In Ireland, lastly, we continue to execute strategically with growth in wholesale and off-net traffic more than compensating for retail pressure on net.
A fixed retail ARPU of EUR 61 remained stable despite no price rise in 2025. Importantly, our fiber rollout, this is critical, remains on track to be substantially complete in 2026, with nearly 20% of the retail base now taking a fiber product, and that will also drive free cash flow in 2027 and beyond. Just one slide on our Liberty Growth portfolio, currently valued at $3.4 billion and centered around four key verticals you know and love, infrastructure and energy, technology and AI, services, and of course, media and sports. The strategy here has been consistent for some time. We are exiting positions that are no longer strategic and using that capital to both invest in new opportunities as they arise and as needed, provide capital for transactions that will unlock value in our telecom assets. That second point is really important.
Historically, we've divested investment positions totaling something like $1.6 billion since 2019, and we've targeted another $700 million in sale proceeds this year, of which, as I said, $300 million is already accounted for. A few comments on sports and live events. We're already invested heavily here through Formula E, but we also believe there are significant structural tailwinds that warrant us evaluating additional opportunities, and we're doing that. These points are probably well known to all of you, I'm sure, but there's clearly a generational shift from physical goods to experiences. That's live events, sports, travel, entertainment, and many of these markets are fragmented and most are protected from AI disruption. It's an interesting space. It's also clear momentum in the sector, right? Just look at sports.
Global revenue in sports growing well in excess of GDP over the last 10 years, and by almost everybody's estimation, poised to increase and accelerate from here. What's our right to play, you might be asking? Well, we know how to consolidate a fragmented industry, both in telecom, but also we've been doing that for decades, and recently with All3Media before exiting at a premium. We've got strong relationships across these sectors. Really, the deal flow is the easy part. When you factor in our expertise in things like treasury operations and technology, it's a pretty strong combination. We have a good track record in sports, specifically with Formula E, the fastest growing motorsport globally, and one of only eight global sports leagues, which is a great segue to my last slide.
I always get excited when I talk about Formula E, sometimes too excited, but I think this moment is perhaps our biggest yet. Look, over the last 10 years, as you've been following this, we have constantly innovated, investing significant energy and time in the car, the technology, and the racing. Well, the wait is over. Last week at the Paul Ricard Circuit in France, Formula E unleashed the next generation race car, Gen4, we call it, and the motorsports world is still reverberating. First of all, you have to see it in person. Yes, it is a beast, but it's a beautiful race car. The step up in power and performance is incredible. 600 kilowatts of power represents a 71% increase in base output over the current Gen3 Evo car. The acceleration is insane, 0 to 100 kilometers in 1.8 seconds.
That's meaningfully faster than a F1 car. Top speeds in excess of 335 kilometers an hour, nearly 210 miles per hour. We estimate, because it's an estimate at this point, that lap times will decrease 10 seconds on average from the current generation car. That's a lifetime in racing. It's also the first single-seater race car with active all-wheel drive all the time, which will provide incredible acceleration and torque out of the turns. Of course, it meets all of our expectations from a sustainability point of view. It's made from at least 20% recyclable materials. It's 98.5% recyclable itself. It allows us to continue claiming that our race-related carbon footprint for the entire championship would fit into one F1 team, by the way. Speaking of F1, yes, we might have taken a few shots at them since the Gen4 launch.
You know, it might be deserved also. You're obviously aware of the issues they're dealing with currently and that they're going through with the hybrid engine. It just reinforces our view that going halfway on anything does not make history. You know, we love the position that we're in technologically, competitively, from an entertainment and motorsports point of view. Hey, just don't take my word for it. In the next slide, you can see, go ahead and scan social media, the motorsports press. There is widespread consensus. I know I'm quoting. This Gen4 car is a quote-unquote monster. It's quote an ushering in the most extreme era of electric cars. It's expected to change perceptions of Formula E forever. Even Max gives it a thumbs up, as you can see on the bottom right.
Anyway, I'm super excited about Gen4 car and Formula E. With that, Charlie, I'll turn it over to you.
Thanks, Mike. My first slide sets out the Q1 financial results for our Benelux companies. As you can see on this slide, we are now presenting Wyre's financial performance for the first time separate to Telenet to give investors clarity on their respective financials before we complete the full separation of the two companies and their capital structures later this year. VodafoneZiggo reported a revenue decline of 1.8% in Q1, driven by a lower customer base and ongoing repricing impact. This was partially offset by the price indexation and higher revenue from Ziggo Sport. Adjusted EBITDA declined 6.4%, driven by higher marketing costs and some incremental investments in network resilience and service reliability, in line with our guidance in March.
At Telenet, revenue was broadly stable in Q1, reflecting our strategic decision not to renew Belgian football rights, which was partly offset by a strong broadband performance, which was driven by effective cross-selling into the video customer base. Adjusted EBITDA grew 8.9%, driven by lower content costs following the exit from the football broadcasting rights. At Wyre, revenue declined by 1%, impacted by the implementation of a new pricing model, which was partially offset by strength in wholesale growth. Adjusted EBITDA declined by 4.6%, and this was driven by an investment in build capability as we start to accelerate Wyre's fiber build-out capability. Turning to the U.K. and Ireland, Virgin Media O2 delivered a total service revenue decline of 3% on a guidance basis.
This was impacted by competitive pressure in the consumer fixed market and lower B2B revenue as the newly rebranded O2 business rationalizes its product portfolio to support its long-term growth in the mobile segment. This was partially offset by wholesale revenue growth, which was supported by growth in MVNO revenue and adjusted EBITDA declined by 3.4% as a result of the lower total service revenues and a non-cash provision for legal matters recorded in the quarter. This was partially offset by cost reduction initiatives. At Virgin Media Ireland, revenues declined by 1.4% in Q1, impacted by intense competition in the consumer fixed and mobile markets, as well as a decline in advertising revenues at VMTV. This was partially offset by a strong wholesale performance.
Meanwhile, adjusted EBITDA declined by 7.1%, driven by these top-line pressures, and was also impacted by a one-off benefit in Q1 last year. Turning to the next slide, we remain committed to our disciplined capital allocation model as we rotate capital into higher growth investments and strategic transactions. Starting in the top left, Telenet reported EUR 10 million of free cash flow during the quarter and is expected to deliver at least EUR 20 million of free cash flow for the full year. Additionally, Liberty Corporate delivered adjusted EBITDA of negative $2 million, putting us firmly on track to achieve our full-year 2026 guidance of negative $50 million.
Turning to the bottom left, CapEx has meaningfully stepped down at Telenet in Q1 on a guidance basis, driven by the 5G upgrade nearing completion at the end of 2025 and lower spend on digital platforms. Capital intensity remains elevated at the other opcos, reflecting investments in our fixed networks and also 5G upgrades. Moving to the Liberty Growth walk in the top right, the fair market value of our growth portfolio remained broadly stable versus 2025 year end at $3.4 billion.
This was driven by modest investments in AtlasEdge, egg Power, nexfibre, and EdgeConneX, offset by the partial disposals of our ITV and some of our EdgeConneX stake, as well as a positive fair market value adjustment at EdgeConneX, along with the recent decision to move Liberty Bloom out of our Corporate and Services segment and into the growth portfolio. Turning to our cash walk on the bottom right, we ended the quarter with a consolidated cash balance of EUR 1.9 billion. Q1 distributable free cash flow was impacted by high CapEx levels related to the fiber to the home rollouts at Wyre and Virgin Media Ireland, in addition to working capital movements at Telenet.
It's worth noting, we continue to anticipate that Wyre will draw on its standalone facility following BCA approval and will fully repay the short-term funding provided by Liberty Global consolidated cash via Telenet. As a reminder, we are aiming to end 2026 with around $1.5 billion of corporate cash, despite the expected outflows associated with the incremental Vodafone stake and also, to a lesser extent, the Netomnia acquisition. Finally, turning to our full-year guidance targets for 2026, we are reconfirming all guidance metrics of VMO2, VodafoneZiggo, and Telenet, as well as our guidance for corporate costs. That concludes our prepared remarks for Q1, and I'd like to hand over to the operator for Q&A.
Thank you. We will now begin the Q&A session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star followed by 1 on your telephone keypad. If you would like to remove that question, please press star followed by 2. Again, to ask a question, press star 1. As a reminder, if you are using a speakerphone, please remember to pick up your handset before asking a question. We will pause here briefly as questions are registered. Our first question comes from the line of Carl Murdock-Smith with Citigroup. Carl, your line is now open.
That's great. Thank you very much. Two questions, please. Firstly, I wanted to ask on Virgin Media O2 about the wholesale service revenue growth. In the release, you say that that included GBP 15 million of fixed pre-enablement and installation income. Am I right in saying that that increase was due to a change in accounting treatment, meaning that it's now recognized as revenue, whereas previously it wasn't? I recognize that it's low margin, but that has provided almost a 1% boost to service revenue overall in Q1. My question is, did you know about that change in treatment when you issued the guidance in February? Does it provide potential upside to the revenue guide of 3%-5% decline, particularly as you've come in at the very high end of that range in Q1?
Then secondly, I just wondered if you could expand slightly on the O2 Satellite news and your kind of level of excitement around that. How much customer interest are you anticipating? More broadly, just what is your view on the role of satellite in telecoms as a complement or competitor going forwards? Thank you.
Satellite question about you. Over to Lutz first. Let me just say that, you know, as we look at the satellite space, generally, we think, of course, satellite broadband, Starlink broadband has a role to play on the planet. There will be plenty of people who will utilize that broadband service and need that broadband service. We believe the direct-to-device mobile opportunity is far more limited by technology, by market access. We do like the idea of having a satellite service attached to our mobile network. We think it adds, you know, just another level of service and commitment to customers. Of course, the U.K. is the first market where we have done that. Lutz, I'll turn it over to you for satellite. Someone, Charlie, I guess, will answer the wholesale question. Lutz?
Hi, Carl. We are very satisfied with the launch of O2 Satellite. Not disclosing numbers, but the fact that we have at the moment not the iPhone available, we will have it available in a week from now, and we have already quite a high demand, is leading us to the assumption that this is really a reliable service, an interesting and attractive service for customers. Also in combination with our improved mobile network, our 5G standalone coverage, we are really creating the right perception for customers, which means we have the most reliable mobile network from everybody in terms of coverage and data speed. Therefore we are very happy with that.
Charlie, you wanna address the wholesale revenue?
Just on the wholesale revenue, I mean, I think it was basically in budget and, you know, that is a very difficult business to forecast by its very nature 'cause it's. I think it was a pretty strong quarter. Do you have anything to add on that?
I mean, I can give some color, right? I mean, I think Carl, you're right. It was not, we didn't account it the same way before. The reason for that was not to beef up our service revenue. As you see, right, we are coming currently more at the upper end than of the guidance. The reason for that is that will be a growing and a continuous service revenue stream. We will more and more connect customers either from other networks or from other ISPs. Therefore, when you look at that way, I think that makes change makes sense. As you said yourself, right, we are coming in at the upper end of our guidance. You could track that number a little bit.
It is 0.7% of it, if you want to accrue for it, but it won't change anything in the guidance. I mean, we wouldn't change it. It's only 1 quarter. So far we are happy with what we have.
Makes sense. That's great. Thanks very much.
Operator.
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Polo Tang with UBS. Polo, your line is now open.
Yeah. Hi. Thanks for taking the questions. I have 2. The first one is just on U.K. competitive dynamics for Lutz. Can you maybe talk through how the recent price rises in April have landed? Because the percentage increase is quite large, and I think it's double-digit for most subscribers. I'm just wondering if there's been any change in terms of churn. Separately, your postpaid mobile losses are continuing, how optimistic are you that this can stabilize through the year? Second question is just a broader question on use of cash going forward. You've talked a lot in this, the prepared remarks about ventures and the focus on sports and media. I think press reports suggested you were considering buying a European NBA franchise.
Are you pivoting the group more towards media and sports, or is the plan still to break up the group and return cash to shareholders? Any color on that would be great. Thanks.
Sure. I'll start with that, Polo. They're not mutually exclusive. That's point 1. Point 2 is our primary commitment, and I think it should be clear, but I'll repeat it here, is to create value for shareholders. We believe, as I've said a few different times, the biggest opportunity to do that is to highlight and find ways to, you know, illuminate value in our telecom business. That is our priority. That is number 1. As I mentioned a moment ago in my remarks, when we look at the use of capital, that factors in squarely to that to the strategy. As I said, we will use capital and rotate capital into growth opportunities should they be presented to us, but also into the telecom business if it helps to unlock value for shareholders.
I think I went on to say that second one is an important point. That's the first part of the answer. I'd say secondly, we are opportunistically looking at and being presented with sorts of opportunities. Sorry, somebody's ringing. With opportunities in that sports space and in the media space generally. There's a reason why the portfolio was $3.4 billion large, because we have been very active as an investor. You know, maybe it's been quiet and we don't spend as much time on our earnings calls doing it, but it's, you know, it's arguably the biggest component of our stock price today are the investments that we've assembled strategically and purposely over the last, you know, let's say five to seven years.
You know, we're divesting ourselves of a huge chunk of those investments, and rightly so, 'cause we need cash to do the things we've been talking about today. Then we will opportunistically look at new investments if they make sense. Don't get me wrong, we are committed to the unlock strategy, and that is priority number 1. Lutz, you wanna talk about competitive nature of U.K.?
Yes. Good afternoon, Polo Tang. In mobile, you see in our numbers that we have been tracking in service revenue around 3%. This is before the price rise. Right, a reason for the net losses in Q1 was the higher price rise we decided for. We are seeing this landing very well. We have the first months now of the 2nd quarter behind us, Polo Tang. Our explanation for that is that those who didn't want to pay it left and for that has materialized. We don't see any spike in churn. Obviously we also have to wait for the May, our findings here are so far so good. On the fixed side, the competitive situation is also unchanged, I would say.
All nets are very aggressive as we are now. Other competitors have to follow. Here, remember I said at the last call, we have to optimize our prevention machine as we used to do it with the retention machine, which we have done now. Therefore, we are quite proud about the fact that we have almost managed to stabilize our fixed customer base in Q1, and we expect something like that in the future. Yes, it comes at the cost of some ARPU, which is 1.6%, but in the scheme of things that is a balanced approach.
Let me finish with to remind you, when we've given the guidance, right, 70%-80% of the service revenue decline is attributed to our expectation on the fixed consumer service revenue market. That means that we are planning for a recovery in mobile service revenue, Polo, and we are going to see this as we speak from the price rise in Q2.
Thanks, Lutz.
Thanku
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Robert Grindle with Deutsche Bank. Robert, your line is now open.
Yeah. Thank you. Afternoon, gents. I see the progress on the long-form agreement with Proximus, approval for the collaboration is still outstanding. What happens if you're delayed for another 6 to 9 months? Do you progress the build as planned, or is the project pushed back? I think Charlie said the Wyre revenues were impacted by a new pricing model. Could the Wyre Telenet ServCo financials change from here? Should there be a change in the wholesale rates associated with any approval? Will this financial base you've given us now be effectively unchanged? Thanks.
Thanks, Robert. We got John Porter on the line, who's worked tirelessly on this Proximus transaction.
Which I must say marks an outstanding result. Outstanding result for Telenet and for us. Do you wanna speak to the regulatory process from here, John?
Sure. Well, we've been in lockstep with the competition authority and the BIPT over the last 2 years. They are right up to date on every aspect of the transaction between ourselves and Proximus. We have very positive inclination from them and belief that they will expedite the final review of the transaction. There is a necessary 30-day review at the European Commission. That is not an approval process. It's just a chance for them to reflect on the transaction and see if it has broader implications. You know, we are cautiously optimistic that we will complete this transaction over the next, say, 6 to 8 weeks. It's a virtual impossibility that it would go longer than that because I think we'd all down tools.
The main critical path has been achieved between ourselves and Proximus, and everybody's ready to get going.
Let me just step in on the.
I don't know.
As we're separating the two companies.
Oh, go ahead, Charlie. Sorry.
I was going to say we're separating the two companies. There is a little bit of tweaking. For example, there is a bit of movement on the wholesale rate to Telenet, and there's also some management fees that are being reevaluated. I think we'll get a more stable view on the numbers in Q2, but I would say it's pretty good news for the ServCo. I'd also say on the financing side, just to, you know, real shout-out to my treasury team, the EUR 4.35 billion of underwritten financing that's clearly in place and we could draw, has now been fully syndicated, which is a great success. Very successfully syndicated.
With the completion of the BCA approval, we're drawing that down and indeed paying some of the money that we decided was more efficient to bridge from our balance sheet rather than draw revolvers to do so. I think it's all around good news for the eventual Ziggo Group spin, because I think the Telenet part of the equation is very much on track for the free cash flow target we set them in 2028.
Great. Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Joshua Mills with BNP Paribas. Joshua, your line is now open.
Hi, guys. Thank you for the questions. Two from my side. One was just going back to slide 6, where you lay out the strategic plan for the new Ziggo Group. My question is around the leverage. There's a lot of moving parts there. Can you just remind us what the pro forma leverage position of this business would be today if you put it together? How much you're expecting to bring in from the Wyre state sale, and then the other asset sales that make up the EUR 1.2 billion-EUR 1.4 billion. I just wanna understand the assumptions underpinning that and what you're at today, and then how you get down to the 4.5 times. That would be the first question.
The second question is just around the Dutch business. We've seen continued improvement in the broadband performance. Can you give a bit more color as to what's driving that on the customer side on perception? Is it people happier with price? Is it that they've noticed a change in the network quality? Any detail you have would be great. As a final add-on, your competitors have highlighted potential benefits from the data breach at Odido, and I think, you know, in the Q1 and probably rolling into Q2, Q3, net add trends there. How much of an impact have you seen from that on your own business in Q1 and Q2? Thanks.
Thanks, Joshua. Stephen will prepare our answers to the Dutch questions. On the asset sales, the EUR 1.2 billion-EUR 1.4 billion, those consist primarily of towers and technical facilities, et cetera. We're not really providing a breakdown of those numbers today 'cause we're in active, you know, sale process. We're not gonna provide, you know, expectations or estimates of where we think value is, but we think that's the range of total combined asset sales, which would be used to pay down debt. Charlie, you wanna address the pro forma leverage? It really depends on what point in time you look for that number and what's happened to the Wyre. Do you wanna address that, Charlie?
Yeah. I mean, it's actually a very complicated question because clearly the Belgian assets that are going to go into the Ziggo Group do not include, 'cause there will be a full separation of the Wyre assets. With the EUR 4.35 billion of underwritten and now syndicated debt, we will therefore be paying down debt at Telenet or Telenet ServCo, but Telenet will be what we'll call it going forward. It remains that because of the investment profile, VodafoneZiggo is relatively higher elevated. There's a lot of moving parts in answering that question. I would just reconfirm what Mike said, is we're very confident in a path to get down to the around 4.5 times by 2028.
It does depend on some asset sales, but we feel pretty good about those being delivered. With those asset sales and indeed, you know, continuing organic EBITDA growth, particularly in Holland, I think we should be there or thereabouts on target. Very happy to take it offline to go through some of these 'cause there's a lot of moving parts.
Yeah
It's in the low to mid fives.
Yeah. The combined group is going to be in the low to mid fives. Telenet itself will be in the mid fours. VodafoneZiggo will be higher. We'll start layering in the various de-leveraging steps, additional steps as well. There's a clear path. You know, perhaps next call, Joshua, we'll give you a little bit more detail. That is the general trend.
That's, that's great. Just to be clear, this isn't assuming any injection of cash. Sorry. There's no assumption of cash going in from Liberty Global into Telco.
The only other comment I'll make is actually, look, you know, clearly.
Yeah. Go ahead. Thanks.
No cash from corporate. I think it is important to know that we are putting our money where our mouth is. There's no distributions to Liberty Global in terms of equity distributions. We're, you know, we're reinvesting the free cash flow of Holland back in the business this year and indeed in Belgium. That, you know, is a commitment to our bondholders and also to the fact that we are very confident in this growth profile. Do you wanna answer the question?
Yeah. In terms of the operational performance of the broadband business.
Yeah. Can you hear me? Yeah.
Yeah.
In terms of the operational performance of the broadband business over the last 12 months, if you follow the story, we've done a number of very clear interventions. The first is we got our pricing right for the broadband products that we're selling. We were mispriced in the marketplace. We fixed that a year ago. When we talk about the back book we're pricing, we're pleased with the progress we've made on that. You haven't seen that in the RP, so we've managed that, I think, pretty well. Second thing we've done is we've gotten on top of churn. We've been much more proactive in how we manage our customer base, which I think has had an effect on bringing churn down. We're now down 3 points year-on-year. We've invested more in marketing by repositioning the business.
The business was underspending on marketing and was out of sync with how, in my view, connectivity should be sold. We've invested, as you saw, in upgrading the speeds of the network. You've seen us launch. We're the only national 2 gigabit service, we've taken speed as a headwind off the table for us. More generally, I think we've done a pretty good job of just tightening how we take the business to market. You've seen that flow through sequentially each quarter as each of these initiatives have landed. We have a series of initiatives coming through the rest of 2026, which we anticipate to continue to help us with the momentum behind the story.
The [Odido question, Steven]
I'm sorry, I missed the Odido question. Can you repeat that?
The question was, what are you.
Yeah. It was.
Do you see any benefit from their cyber attack?
Yeah. It happened late in the quarter. It happened around week 10, so we saw some impact from that. We didn't see a lot of it in the quarter. Because of the size of their mobile base, we felt a bit more of it in the mobile base. nothing that I think is material in the Q1 results 'cause it only represented a handful of weeks.
Great. I mean, I was more talking about the Q2 results. Obviously, it happened later in the first quarter, but are you seeing any impact so far in Q2?
No, we're happy with our progress on Q2 so far, but it's quite early. I'll have to come back to you when we do the Q2 results in a couple of months.
Thanks.
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of James Ratzer with New Street Research. James, your line is now open.
Yes. Good afternoon. Thank you for taking the question. I had two really both around Belgium. In Telenet, you obviously had a very good quarter in terms of broadband net adds. I'd love if you can just give a bit more color behind what's driving that. Is that now growth out of footprint in Wallonia? Is that coming on your kind of base brand within Flanders, or is it something else? I'd be interested to kind of get a just a bit more color on the drivers there of broadband subs growth. Then secondly, just going back to the point that was raised earlier about Wyre revenue growth, which was down year-on-year in Q1.
Is that a kind of 1-off for this quarter, Charlie, you were mentioning around pricing, and it goes back to growth in the following quarters? I'd just love to understand a bit more about the kind of dynamics there between kind of P and Q, because I've been thinking that with kind of pricing there, we should see Wyre as a top-line growth company. Thank you.
John, you wanna take the Belgium question?
Yeah, I can take it. On the first, on the broadband, the BAU has been strong, particularly in the BASE brand. Their growth is about 50/50 between the Telenet footprint and growth in the South. We are steadily growing, and that growth in the South is increasing incrementally. There is what will be a, you know, year-long enhancement of that growth as we migrate out of DVB-C and into full IP for our video distribution. We are the last operator in the market to have DVB-C where you don't require internet to get television, but we are shutting that down over the next year. You know, we're expecting to see continued strong growth.
As you can see, the quarter ending 25 and the first quarter of the year, very strong and those are the main drivers. On the Wyre revenue, there we implemented a wholesale deal, a new wholesale deal on the HFC, which is essentially structuring the higher speed tiers to be more accessible. The wholesale price is going down a little bit, and that's what you're seeing flowing through. That will be part of the overarching deal done with Proximus, and we'll be able to give you more detail on that down the road. The drop will not continue to drop, but it is the new HFC wholesale pricing.
Thank you, John. From those new prices, do prices then rise with inflation from this slightly lower level looking into 2027, 2028?
There is an inflationary component to both the fiber wholesale and the HFC wholesale.
Great. Okay. Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Matthew Harrigan with StoneX. Matthew, your line is now open.
Oh, thank you. This is very much a conjectural question rather than kind of blocking, tackling valuation anomalies. You made a quick reference to more benign, you know, regulatory environment in your markets. What's even more interesting on a macro basis is, you know, the emphasis on Europe's industrial base and defense. Clearly, you know, telecom is a vital, you know, pivot in defense. Is there any possibilities for your telecom business or I guess particularly your venture portfolio in that end? I'm sure, you know, Charlie and Lutz aren't gonna be manufacturing drones, but it still feels like something that could be an interesting, you know, tailwind, particularly since you're involved in so many areas and verticals. Thank you.
Hey, Matthew. Listen, the whole sovereignty debate, it's no longer a debate, it's a, it's a, you know, verifiable conviction, is net positive for us in the telecom space. Now we won't all benefit equally, but every telecom player will benefit from the European Union and countries within the European Union's focus with their own, you know, cybersecurity, their own data protection, their own data centers, their own AI infrastructure.
Inevitably, whether it's AtlasEdge or our investment in EdgeConneX on the infrastructure side in our Liberty Growth portfolio, whether it's our opcos themselves and their ability to provide services and B2B services and connectivity to governments and others, I think it's a net positive for telcos in Europe, which is why I mentioned it along with the loosening regulatory framework, which I think will also be a net positive. We may or may not be part of any of that consolidation, we know that consolidation itself brings benefits to customers as well as operators and investors. I think it's a real positive step.
In terms of defense itself, we're not, you know, unlike perhaps some of our peers who are more closely aligned with the government, we are not involved in any specific defenseType investment opportunities or infrastructure. If we were approached, we would certainly consider it if it was consistent with our, you know, overall strategy. I don't see us veering off, if you will, into that, but.
Right. Sure.
Does that answer your question, Matt?
You're not [audio inaudible] . Absolutely. Thanks, Mike.
No. You got it.
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Ulrich Rathe with Bernstein Societe Generale Group. Ulrich, your line is now open.
Yeah, thanks very much. Thanks very much. Two questions. First one is, Mike, you talked about the improving re-regulatory climate with regards to consolidation. Other management teams in the sector have flagged mixed signals they perceive to come out of Europe. Could you talk through what specifically you have in mind there? What insights or news you have to share on which you base this more positive assessment? The second question is on the EUR 1 billion synergies that you talk about in Ziggo, can you talk about the sort of rough makeup of that in terms of operational and other sources of synergies? Thank you.
Sure. On the synergies point, I don't know if we've been specific, so I'm gonna pause. You know, but it typically you wouldn't be surprised to learn that it's consisting of three or four key line items. There's a financial synergy, that's more of a, you know, more of, I would say, a free cash flow type synergy from, that we haven't. Well, from taxes, essentially. There's operating costs that we think are achievable and create more efficiencies around. There's procurement and CapEx type synergy. So it's not going to be. When we get closer to legal day 1, we'll clearly provide more detail to you. Right now, we're still in the midst of closing the deal.
You know, there's lots of things we can be doing and will be doing in those two operations and within and among them to create those synergies. If I had to put my team on the spot right now, they'd say that's probably a low number. On the regulatory side, we did just, you know, get the EU merger guidelines released, and they are quite positive, you know, and, you know, at least in comparison to the kind of posture and position that the European Union would take previously when it came to in-market consolidation, right? I mean, they're looking at a much more, I guess, modern and pragmatic approach and, you know, they're seeing that benefits could certainly accrue from mergers versus just always seeing the negative in those mergers.
There's always been a structural bias against scale, now they're seeing, well, actually scale could increase investment, could increase innovation. It's actually spelled out in the document that was released recently. That to us is, you know, when it's in writing. If it's just a speech, I don't give it much credit. When they put it in writing, as they have with these new EU merger guidelines, that is a positive step. It needs to be put to the test, there will be plenty of deals that will put it to the test soon, I imagine.
Never before have they written down in black and white the sort of statements that we're reading today in terms of, you know, which are consistent with the arguments we've been making, that consolidation in market is the first step to repair in the European Telecom space.
Very helpful. Thank you very much.
Yep.
Thank you. Our last question comes from the line of David Wright with Bank of America. David, your line is now open.
Okay. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah, last question. A couple please, guys. Just on the, I guess it's for Ziggo, DOCSIS 4.0. I think you may have said, Mike, that there are some trials ongoing. If we could just get some estimates of maybe the sort of trajectory of commercial launch for 4.0 in Holland. When do you expect the first sort of, you know, significant retail launch, et cetera? Is it something that you think you could even price a little as you move into the real sort of mega tiers of speed? Then the second question, maybe a little more conceptual.
You know, we're observing a lot of discussion around the kind of InfraCo, ServCo split, and you guys have obviously sort of embraced that. You know, there's obviously a clear sort of capital allocation justification and the ability to, you know, to separate the two businesses that are quite structurally different. I just wondered, does having a separate InfraCo make a more agile ServCo in terms of just day-to-day, you know, operations? Is the business just, you know, more able to respond and sort of change shape in the sort of digital age? It's a little more conceptual, Mike. If you've got anything to add on that, I'd appreciate it. Thank you.
Sure, sure. Steve Malcolm, jump in here if I get it wrong, I believe our 4 and 8 gig trials are the latter part of the year, maybe even late Q3, Q4. What we did was get a, you know, the field trials underway to demonstrate that it works, it works well, that the technology we're using is really state-of-the-art, even in relation to the U.S. operators. As we get closer to going public in the latter part of this year, we'll have more information. It's happening, and we think it's gonna be a big positive for the market and for our, for our business for sure. On the, on the ServCo side, look at, I mean, Belgium is the test.
What does it do when you end up taking the fixed network, you still own the mobile network, but taking the fixed network and putting it into a separate entity? I think, and John will agree, I'm sure, it forces you to be more efficient, more agile, and your margins change. All of a sudden, there's a wholesale fee in your P&L that you have to account for. In principle, Telenet will continue to be a very competitive brand and a very competitive B2C company and B2B company. It's with respect to its network, its fixed network, it will be renting instead of owning that network. The relationship it's developed with Wyre is highly integrated, highly, you know, with mutual benefits both directions.
On balance, I think, and this is the only place we've done it really is Belgium. I think on balance, and John can chime in, I think it does create a bit more energy in that ServCo, a bit more focus on margins and on competition with a little less to worry about and a slightly better, you know, CapEx profile. That CapEx profile frees up free cash. You know, Telenet will generate significant free cash here shortly as it has, and we'll have to figure out how to reinvest that free cash, whether it's in de-leveraging or in actually new products and services. Any, anything more to add to that, John?
Yeah, a bit. The CapEx we are spending, we are now concentrating on customer experience. We pivoted our strategy, obviously away from network and product differentiation, because we have to, into customer experience. The timing is right because, of course, with a lot of AI initiatives around the company, and a new greenfield CRM platform, the focus is well and truly on straight through digital journeys for our customers, which delivers better experience and a better bottom line. I think certainly your hypothesis is valid.
Okay. Good to hear. All right. Listen, we appreciate everybody joining us on the call. Thanks, David. It's been a good start to the year. I hope you agree, and we're really encouraged by the progress that we're making. Trust me, we are laser-focused on value creation and value unlock, starting, of course, in the Benelux, where we're not only, you know, performing well, but the strategic roadmap, and as I pointed out, the building blocks are all in place. We'll keep you abreast and updated on those things and we'll speak to you soon. Thanks, everybody. Have a great weekend.
Thank you. That will conclude today's conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect your lines.