2degrees suffers widespread outage at same time key merger details unveiled

Thursday, 3 February 2022

2degrees customers reported mobile outages in most major cities on Thursday morning just as the company was announcing that Orcon head Mark Callander would lead company post-merger.

Thousands of 2degrees customers were reporting problems accessing the company’s mobile network on Thursday morning.

Customers in several cities including Auckland, Hamilton, Christchurch, Dunedin and New Plymouth reported that they were unable to connect to its network from about 9am.

A statement later posted on 2degrees’ website stated that its service had been restored at 10:06am and advised customers who were still experiencing problems to re-start their phones.

2degrees spokeswoman Caitlin Madden said there had been an “internal issue” which the company had now fixed.

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The company had initially suspected the outage reports were attributable to a Chorus outage on the West Coast due to storm damage.

Madden said only some customers were impacted by the broader outage, but customer reports indicated it was widespread.

The outage took place at the same time that 2degrees and Orcon issued a separate statement announcing that Orcon chief executive Mark Callander would lead the two businesses following their planned $1.7 billion merger.

But the merged company will be known as 2degrees.

The takeover of 2degrees by Australian-owned Orcon has yet to be cleared by the Commerce Commission, but is widely expected to pass its competition test.

“2degrees has built a fantastic brand, one that really speaks to New Zealanders and represents choice, world-class customer service and Kiwi innovation,” Callander said announcing those details of the merger.