Euronews: Vodafone Shares up on AT&T Takeover Rumor

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: TDC cuts its outlook; Middle Eastern operators can't share nicely; Prismgate gets really serious.

Paul Rainford, Assistant Editor, Europe

November 1, 2013

2 Min Read
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Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: TDC cuts its outlook; Middle Eastern operators can't share nicely; Prismgate gets really serious.

  • Vodafone Group plc (NYSE: VOD)'s share price rose 2.2 percent to 229.45 pence Friday morning, possibly fueled by a report on Bloomberg that a potential takeover of the British group by AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T) is very much back on the cards. According to "people familiar with the matter," AT&T execs are getting ahead of themselves by conducting internal talks about which of Vodafone's assets they would dispose of and which they would retain if the deal went through. Speculation about AT&T's European ambitions comes around regularly, with Telefónica SA (NYSE: TEF) also often cited as a potential target. (See Euronews: AT&T Hints at Mobile M&A Action and Euronews: AT&T Goes on the Prowl.)

    • Disappointing third-quarter numbers from Danish operator TDC A/S (Copenhagen: TDC) have prompted it to cut its full-year outlook, reports Reuters. TDC's revenue fell 6 percent year-on-year to 1 billion Danish kroner (US$181 million), which was slightly below analysts' expectations.

    • Middle Eastern operators Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Co. (du) and Etisalat still can't agree on the terms of a network-sharing deal, four years after the idea was first mooted, according to a report on Arabian Business. Apparently, the technical issues have been resolved, but financial ones haven't.

    • Prismgate part 94: Reuters reports that German journalists have been advised by their union to stop using the Google and Yahoo search engines and email services following the reports of data-snooping by US and British intelligence agencies. As if journalists would stoop to such unreliable and basic research tools. Now then, where's that NSA Wikipedia page I had open a minute ago… (See British Spooks Tap the Global Net, Prism in a Big Data World, and Merkel's Mobile.)

    • Telia Company 's Finnish subsidiary, Sonera, has paid out €41.2 million ($55.7 million) for 2 x 10MHz frequencies in the 800MHz band, which it will use to significantly increase its 4G coverage. The license that accompanies the spectrum mandates that Sonera achieves 4G coverage of 95 percent in Finland within three years.

      — Paul Rainford, Assistant Editor, Europe, Light Reading

About the Author

Paul Rainford

Assistant Editor, Europe, Light Reading

Paul is based on the Isle of Wight, a rocky outcrop off the English coast that is home only to a colony of technology journalists and several thousand puffins.

He has worked as a writer and copy editor since the age of William Caxton, covering the design industry, D-list celebs, tourism and much, much more.

During the noughties Paul took time out from his page proofs and marker pens to run a small hotel with his other half in the wilds of Exmoor. There he developed a range of skills including carrying cooked breakfasts, lying to unwanted guests and stopping leaks with old towels.

Now back, slightly befuddled, in the world of online journalism, Paul is thoroughly engaged with the modern world, regularly firing up his VHS video recorder and accidentally sending text messages to strangers using a chipped Nokia feature phone.

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