Pipex has long been the subject of takeover speculation and the news could well be a way to force the issue by telling potential bidders to put up for shut up.
It is itself an acquisitive company and last year it spent 44m pound ($82m) in March to buy Caudwell Communications Ltd, which traded under the name Homecall. Then it bought consumer broadband provider Bulldog for 12m pounds ($22.5m) in cash and in October it paid 24m pound ($45m) for the UK business of Toucan, the telecoms provider, from IDT Telecom.
It expected that revenue for the year would more than double to 295m pounds ($570m).
