Spark New Zealand Limited is a New Zealand telecommunications and digital services company providing fixed-line telephone services, mobile phone 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 larger companies by value on the New Zealand Exchange (NZX), ranked at 14th behind Chorus in April 2026. The company is a member of New Zealand Telecommunications Forum.
Telecom New Zealand was formed in 1987 from a division of the New Zealand Post Office, and privatised 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, 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 into New Zealand Post Limited (trading as NZPost), Telecom Corporation of New Zealand Limited (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 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, 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), subsequently acquired by Vodafone, set up the first mobile network 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 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 technology, called JetStream, 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 costing $140,000.
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$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: Deane resigned as chairman, and was replaced by Wayne Boyd the following month. July: Matt Crockett was appointed CEO of Telecom's newly formed Wholesale division. All Computerland branches around New Zealand were rebranded as Gen-i.
2007 16 January: The Librarians Association of New Zealand put in a complaint about a Telecom advertisement where three young school children said, "Only dumb kids read books, brainy kids have broadband." Originally Telecom said it was the view of the young children and not Telecom and the advertisement was unscripted, later Telecom chose to edit the advertisement to remove the comments. 19 January: It was reported that Paritai Drive, Ōrākei, one of the richest streets in Auckland, was still not capable of receiving a broadband SL service and there were many other well populated areas around New Zealand still not capable of receiving broadband. Opposition Woosh Wireless immediately tested its service in the area and gave residents the opportunity to join its wireless broadband service. 5 February: Telecom announced that from March 2007 it would begin rolling out ADSL2+, more than a year after the original roll out date. 31 March: Telecom shut down its old 025 D-AMPS/TDMA network with all 025 phones changed to 027 (CDMA). May 2007: British Telecom had 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 was in a similar position to that of NZ Telecom; the British broadband network has since been broken up and the NZ government was 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 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, 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.
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 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 and SkyTV. Lightbox went live on 27 August 2014.