UPC Switzerland

UPC Switzerland LLC, trading exclusively under the brand name UPC, is the largest broadband cable operator in Switzerland. Founded 1994 through multiple mergers between smaller companies, it is part of Liberty Global Europe's UPC Broadband division since the end of 2005.

UPC operates in Switzerland, including the cities of Zürich, Geneva, Basel, Berne, Lausanne, Lucerne and Winterthur, and Vorarlberg (Austria) serving 1.3 million cable television customers, as well as approximately 250 smaller broadband cable operators.

In the 1930s the first cable network operators started to broadcast a variety of radio channels to households via cable. One of these cable network operators was Rediffusion S.A., established in 1931, which disseminated radio programmes per wire broadcasting. At the end of the 1950s Rediffusion began to broadcast the first black/white television channels from the Üetliberg antenna tower in Zürich. In 1994 Rediffusion and other independent cable network companies merged to form Cablecom, owned by Siemens, VEBA and Swisscom.

Cablecom acquired the successful Internet service provider SwissOnline in 1998. Over the following years the cable network operator grew by acquiring various cable network companies including, for instance Balcab and Sitel. These takeovers allowed cablecom to extend its network throughout Switzerland. In 2000 the previous owners of Cablecom sold out to the British-American NTL for a price of 5.8 billion Swiss francs. In the years that followed, operative business was sustainably improved. In the wake of financial difficulties NTL sold Cablecom to a group of banks and private investors in 2003.

The owners planned to go public with Cablecom in the middle of October 2005. After Liberty Global Europe, a wholly owned subsidiary of Liberty Global acquired Cablecom for 2.8 billion on 30 September 2005, the planned IPO was withdrawn. In the years that followed Cablecom invested in its network development. In 2007 the company launched high definition television (HDTV). Two years later cablecom introduced its first combination deals (all-in-one packages with Internet, telephony and television).