The deal targets the US giant’s operations in Romania, Germany, Czech Republic and Hungary.
In Romania, Vodafone and Liberty Global’s businesses are highly complementary. Vodafone is primarily active in mobile markets, whereas UPC Romania is mainly a provider of cable broadband and television services.
With the acquisition of the Romanian operations of UPC, the third largest player on cable TV markets and the third largest on the fixed-line broadband Internet market, Vodafone, the second largest player on the Romanian mobile telephony market, will join a fiercer competition with telecom operators Orange, Telekom and Digi. This is a long-awaited move which turns Vodafone into a relevant player nationwide on the fixed and mobile services market and which will take the annual revenue of the newly established entity near the EUR1 billion mark.
Vodafone Romania CEO Murielle Lorilloux said this acquisition will bring significant changes, create a major provider of convergent telecommunication services and contribute to boosting the competition.
„Together, UPC and Vodafone will be able to provide gigabit-speed broad¬band internet and 5G technology“, said UPC Romania CEO Mihnea Radulescu.
The transaction will not include UPC Romania’s satellite TV business, Focus Sat, which has 356,000 customers.
The transaction is expected to be approved mid-2019.