French operator Bouygues Telecom has pulled out of bidding for 35% of state-owned Tunisie Telecom, a Dow Jones report said.
'After studying the dossier, we decided not to go on with the bidding,' a company spokeswoman, quoted by Dow Jones report, said.
The Dow Jones report said Bouygues Telecom was one of three French telecom companies interested in the partial privatization of
Telefonica, the Spanish incumbent telecommunications operator, also pulled out of bidding in October, the report said.
Vivendi Universal's CFO Jacques Espinasse said in November there were only nine candidates left in the race out of the 13 which initially expressed an interest, the Dow Jones report said.
The Dow Jones report further said the value of the Tunisie Telecom stake being sold is at around 1.3 billion euros and a deal is expected to be completed at the end of February or at the beginning of March.