Paraguay’s telecom regulator Conatel (Comisión Nacional de Telecomunicaciones) has authorized Tigo, owned by Millicom International Cellular, to complete its acquisition of Cablevisión. The binding agreement to acquire Paraguay’s cable pay-TV service provider, Cablevisión, for U.S.$150 million was signed in June. Since then, the telephony operators Personal, Claro and Vox have complained that the agreement will create a monopoly.
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The three operators have requested that the Paraguayan Legislative Power intervene. The operators claim that the acquisition would violate the agency’s regulations and create an unconstitutional monopoly that would put both competitors and users at a disadvantage.
However, as syndicate partner Signals Telecom Consulting has noted, the acquisition would not create a monopoly for several reasons. From the mobile service perspective, Tigo competes with three other operators. As for pay-TV services, the company faces a newly liberalized market that is expected to have at least five service providers. “The most important thing to note is the arrival of three companies offering DTH services, allowing for the rapid growth of pay-TV subscribers in the country due to increased coverage and lower prices,” wrote Jose Otero, Signals’ president in his article (read full piece here—in Spanish)
With the conclusion of the Cablevisión acquisition, Tigo will become the largest mobile operator in Paraguay with 3.7 million subscribers, reaching 470,000 of households through Cablevisión’s network and 115,800 pay-TV subscribers. In addition, Tigo will have 11,300 broadband subscribers.
In announcing the decision, Carlos Gomez Zelada, Conatel’s president, said the institution understood that the operation did not conflict with Constitutional regulations or Telecommunications Act 642/95. To members of the press, he said that there is “no violation of the Constitution or the law 642, and it also does not violate any rules,” rejecting the complaint lodged by Personal, Claro and Vox against the operation.
