CK Hutchison, owned by Asia’s richest man, Li Ka-shing, plans to merge O2 with its three network subject to regulatory approval.
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Co-managing director Canning Fok told the Financial Times in an interview that the company discussed an initial public offering of the combined business with external investors, though he didn’t provide details such as the timeline or the deal size.
It is now expected to follow that up with an extensive investigation because of the case’s complexity, according to the sources familiar with the matter.
Hutchison may have to sell parts of the combined entity’s network capacity and spectrum to get the green light, the sources said.
A full-scale or so-called phase two investigation lasts around five months. Similar issues contributed to the failed Denmark deal proposed by TeliaSonera and Telenor because the operators already shared a single network there.
Commission spokesman Ricardo Cardoso and Telefonica declined to comment.
European regulators are scheduled to decide by October 16 whether to approve the O2 deal, which would create Britain’s largest mobile-phone operator by subscribers. “It caused investors to worry that EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager was taking a harder line than predecessor Joaquin Almunia”, claimed Reuters.
CK Hutchison, the parent company of the Three mobile network, agreed in March to buy O2 United Kingdom from Telefonica in a deal worth £9.5bn.
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Given that the mobile networks in the United Kingdom started with the names Racal-Vodafone, Securicor-Cellnet, One-2-One and Orange (nee Hutchison Telecom), one can not assume that O2 and EE will be the names on the shop doors in future.
