The European Commission has pushed back the deadline for completion of its investigation into CK Hutchison’s planned £10.25 billion takeover of O2 in the U.K., it emerged late last week.
The EU’s competition arm will publish its decision on the takeover by 18 April, it revealed on its Website, 20 working days later than the 16 March deadline it set when it opened its in-depth probe last month.
The Commission did not give a reason for the delay. However, Reuters reported that it comes at the request of O2 and Hutchison.
Hutchison aims to acquire O2 and merge it with 3UK, creating the U.K.’s largest mobile network operator by subscribers. However, the deal requires European Commission approval, and recent events have cast doubt on the likelihood of it getting the green light.
Telenor and TeliaSonera in September abandoned their plans to merge their Danish operations after competition commissioner Margrethe Vestager indicated that she would block the deal.
Vestager insisted that Denmark requires four mobile networks in order to remain competitive.
That set alarm bells ringing for those involved in the O2/3UK tie-up, since it would reduce the number of mobile networks in the U.K. to just three.
Vestager has made it clear that all M&A cases will be reviewed on their own merits, but doubts still remain for the U.K., especially after Ofcom chief executive Sharon White also extolled the virtues of the four-operator market.
"We continue to believe that four operators is a competitive number that has delivered good results for consumers and sustainable returns for companies," she said in a speech delivered at the London School of Economics a month ago.
