Swisscom receives greenlight for acquisition of Vodafone Italia
The takeover of Vodafone Italia by Swisscom is nearing completion. All relevant authorities have now approved the €8 billion (CHF7.45 billion) deal.
The takeover has been approved by both the Italian Competition Authority (Autorità Garante della Concorrenza e del Mercato) and the Italian Ministry of Enterprise and Made in Italy (Ministero delle Imprese e del Made in Italy), or MIMIT for short, Swisscom announced on Friday evening. “This paves the way for the emergence of a leading convergent provider in Italy, now that all the relevant authorities have approved the transaction,” said Swisscom.
Behavioral commitments accepted
The Italian competition authority approved the transaction on December 20 and accepted the commitments submitted by Swisscom, it added. Swisscom agrees to continue to offer wholesale services to interested operators in accordance with Fastweb’s current practice and to disclose information in the context of tenders for fixed telephony and connectivity conducted by the public administration, provided that Fastweb or Vodafone Italia are the current providers. An independent trustee will ensure that the obligations are met. The obligations are reportedly valid for three years.
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The Italian Ministry of Enterprise and Made in Italy (MIMIT) has also approved the transaction by approving the change of control of Vodafone Italia as the owner of spectrum licences, Swisscom added. This approval had been granted on December 19 after the Italian supervisory authority for communications and the Italian competition authority had given their approval.
Swisscom expects the transaction to be completed by the first quarter of 2025.
Good addition
Swisscom announced its plans to acquire Vodafone Italia at the end of February this year. The purchase agreement was then signed in mid-March. In the view of the Swiss federal government, all conditions for the acquisition were met. Vodafone Italia is to be merged with the Swisscom subsidiary Fastweb. Fastweb boss Walter Renna was appointed as the new head of the joint company in Italy.
Vodafone Italy and Fastweb complement each other well: while Fastweb has a broadband network, Vodafone Italy contributes a mobile network. According to earlier information, the merger of Fastweb and Vodafone Italy is expected to generate synergies of €600 million per year from 2029.
According to the information at the time, this will create the second-largest telecoms provider in Italy behind the top dog TIM. Fastweb and Vodafone Italia will generate a combined turnover of €7.3 billion and a combined operating profit before depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) of €2.4 billion.
Translated from German by DeepL/jdp
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