Telekom, ready to abandon Romanian market – sources say

German group Telekom is considering selling the operations in Romania, part of a larger restructuring involving the exit from the markets reached after buying OTE, sources from the telecom market say, quoted by G4Media.

Update: Asked by ‘Romanian Journal’ to confirm or deny the reports, the company representatives have replied: “Thank you for your interest in the OTE Group. As is our normal practice, we do not comment on speculation.”

The same source mentions that the discussions about selling Telekom Romania have intensified after the issuing of Emergency Ordinance 114/2018, the so-called ‘ordinance on greed’, which involves a 3% tax on turnover.

It is not clear if the Telekom Romania operations will be sold to a player on the market or to a newcomer.

Telekom has faced problems with the branch in Romania for various reasons. The complicated shareholder situation (the Romanian state owns 45.9% of the fixed telephony division), problems inherited from the Greek company OTE, the challenges on a very competitive market which host three large companies (Orange, Vodafone, RCS).

Telekom has entered the Romanian market in 2014, after buying in 2011 the majority stake from OTE, which owned Cosmote and Romtelecom.

If Telekom leaves the Romanian market, this would impact also the media market, as Telekom Romania owns a sports TV station. ‘Gazeta Sporturilor’ claims that the station owned by Telekom will be taken over by RCS.

GSP informs that RCS-RDS and Orange will share the Telekom subscribers and the TV rights. Thus, DigiSport will remain the sole sports TV station to broadcast Romania’s League 1 and the European football competitions. Part of the employees will be taken over by the new employer, realitatea.net informs.

In turn, Orange will allegedly take over the mobile telephony operations.