TeliaSonera said it had no further information to communicate after reports in Spain said it had commissioned Deutsche Bank to launch the process for a potential sale of its Spanish unit Yoigo.
Citing unnamed sources, Expansion said the Sweden-based group expects to receive offers in the coming weeks, with British venture capital firm Zegona and Spanish operator Másmovil Ibercom cited as the main candidates. The report said bids are expected to be in the range of €500 million ($551 million) to €600 million.
In a statement emailed to FierceWireless:Europe, a TeliaSonera spokesperson said: "We have no new information than what we already have communicated -- that we are reviewing our presence in Spain."
The Swedish operator controls 76.6 per cent of Yoigo, which is Spain's fourth-largest mobile operator after Movistar, Orange Spain and Vodafone Spain. Expansion pointed out that an acquisition by Másmovil would create a new fixed-mobile player on the market: the MVNO acquired some of Jazztel's assets when the fixed operator was bought by Orange Spain.
TeliaSonera has been considering various options for Yoigo for some time. In 2014 the company said it was continuing to review its presence in Spain, noting that its Spanish business remained sub-scale with a market share of around 7 per cent.
Yoigo has struggled to make headway on the market despite an aggressive, low-cost approach. In January this year, it also withdrew from the quadruple-play market more than two years after launching bundles of fixed and mobile services, making it the only one of the four mobile network operators that does not provide a multi-service plan.
Yoigo is now placing its bets on the mobile-only market, and recently reinstated its popular 20 GB smartphone tariff. This means the company once again offers the largest mobile data allowance on the market.
In December last year, the company also said it would invest €25 million in the expansion of its 4G mobile network with the goal of covering 80 per cent of the Spanish population in May 2016.
For more:
- see this Expansion article (in Spanish)
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