BRUSSELS (Reuters) – The European competition authority will approve the proposed acquisition by Orange of a majority stake in Belgian operator VOO, the French group having signed an agreement with its rival Telenet to remedy certain points raised by regulator, sources familiar with the matter said.
Orange could get the green light from the EU by the end of February, the sources added. Neither the European Commission, which must make its decision by April 11, nor Orange wished to comment.
The planned takeover of 75% of VOO, announced in November 2021, values the target at 1.8 billion euros. It would give the French operator control of the cable network in Wallonia and part of the Brussels region against Telenet.
But European authorities are concerned that the transaction would reduce the number of operators in areas covered by VOO’s fixed networks from three to two, and affect third-party mobile networks.
In January, Orange agreed, in an agreement with Telenet, to provide the latter, in the event of completion of the acquisition, access to its fixed network in Wallonia and Brussels, which could remove the reluctance of the EC.
(Report Foo Yun Chee, French version Jean-Stéphane Brosse, edited by Matthieu Protard)
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