While roundly criticising other mobile operators in Europe for lack of imagination, the CEO of KPN, Ad Scheepbouwer, claimed he would be keen to acquire Telefonica O2 Germany given that he believes Spanish-based Telefonica is less interested in building up its Germany division compared with KPN's high priority for the German market.
Scheepbouwer revealed this aim as he blamed other telcos for being slow to adapt to present day market conditions, saying they had forgotten the need to be innovative. This allowed, according to the KPN CEO, other companies like Apple and Google to steal market share. He stressed KPN was looking to partner with start-ups to become more innovative.
Separately, the company indicated it was monitoring the French 3G licence auction, but had no plans to presently enter a bid. "You can never exclude something for the future but at this moment we're not interested. I first want to see how we are doing with our businesses in France," said a KPN exec.
Last week, Telefonica replaced its O2 Germany CEO with former Vodafone veteran, Rene Schuster. O2 Germany trails in fourth place after T-Mobile, Vodafone and KPN's E-Plus mobile unit.
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