It should be an exciting year when it comes to the merger-and-acquisition landscape in Europe as telecom companies look for ways to scale in extremely competitive European markets. We are already seeing some surprising unsolicited bids for companies, so we should see some fun corporate cat fights. Incumbent Portuguese carrier Portugal Telecom shot down a hostile $12.8 billion takeover bid from Sonae late Tuesday night. Of course, Portugal Telecom says the company is worth more. Then there is MVNO Virgin Mobile, which is holding out for more money from NTL. And KPN declared this week that it isn't for sale. KPN is one of the smaller European companies that analysts believe is a takeover target.
For more about Portugal Telecom's rejection of Sonae:
- read this article from telecoms.com (sub. req.)
- check out this article from Dow Jones