Telcos seeking European Commission’s approval to merge Danish operations
Scandinavian mobile operators TeliaSonera and Telenor have offered to sell up to 40% of TT-Netvaerket, their joint network infrastructure company, to a new company in a bid to secure the approval of European Commission antitrust regulators for the proposed merger of the their mobile operations in Denmark.
The two telcos said the new entrant to the Danish market would be able to own an initial 15% stake in TT-Netvaerket, with an option to increase the ownership by 5% a year until it reaches 40%. The new entrant would have access to TT-Netvaerket’s network technologies, in addition to being allowed to sell network capacity to other operators in the Danish market.
The two companies had initially offered to sell blocks of spectrum in the 2.1 GHz band and rent up to 15% of TT-Netvaerket. However, this initial offer received negative feedback, according to press reports.
Danish company TT-Netvaerket, a joint venture between the local units of Swedish operator TeliaSonera and Norway’s Telenor, began operations in 2012 with the merger of TeliaSonera’s and Telenor’s LTE networks, followed by 3G infrastructure. Now the company has completed the consolidation of the GSM portion.
According to press reports, the European regulatory authorities may decide this week if they finally accept this new offer.
European Union antitrust regulators have recently extended the deadline to reach a final decision over the plan by TeliaSonera and Telenor to merge their mobile subsidiaries in Denmark to Oct. 7.
Earlier this year, the European Commission had expressed concern that a joint venture between the two Scandinavian telcos would result in higher prices and decreased innovation in the Danish mobile telephony market. The merger plan would also reduce the number of players in Denmark from its current four to three.
If the merger receives the OK from the European authorities, both Telenor and TeliaSonera will each own 50% of the joint venture, and the combined company will have 40% of the Danish mobile market with 3.5 million subscribers.
The other two mobile operators in Denmark are TDC and Hi3G.
France likely to experience market consolidation during 2016 – Orange
In related EMEA news, French mobile operator Orange’s CEO Stephane Richard expects the local mobile market to experience a wave of consolidations during 2016, once the government awards spectrum in the 700 MHz band for the provision of LTE services.
Last July, the government officially launched the process to award 30 megahertz of spectrum in the 700 MHz band. The French authorities aim to award the new concessions by the end of this year.
The 700 MHz spectrum band is expected to allow French operators to broaden the reach of their LTE networks, which are still limited in scope. French operator Bouygues offers LTE services using 800 MHz, 1.8 GHz and 2.6 GHz spectrum bands; Orange and SFR currently offer LTE services using their 800 MHz and 2.6 GHz spectrum bands; Free uses just the 2.6 GHz band to support LTE services.
