Liberty Global and Vodafone are reportedly in talks about a potential acquisition of Liberty Global's stake in their joint venture Dutch mobile operator VodafoneZiggo. Liberty Global and Vodafone created the JV in 2016 and each hold a 50% stake in the mobile operator.
The transaction could value Vodafone's stake as high as EUR2bn.
The Dutch market has three MNOs - KPN, VodafoneZiggo and Odido (formerly T-Mobile which Deutsche Telekom and Tele2 sold to a consortium of investors). There has been a big and growing competition on pricing and from MVNOs as well well as from fixed operations who accelarate the roll-out of fiber footprint. All these coupled with inflationary pressures, have resulted in impact on the MNO's revenue and decreased ARPU.
Unlike the other two operators, VodafoneZiggo has retained its portfolio of towers in the country.
According to recently released Q4 2024 financial results, in 2024, VodafoneZiggo expanded its footprint with more than 130 macro sites, reaching a total of 3,300 sites at present. We're yeat to see whether a future transaction will impact the Dutch towers - Vodafone has carved out the vast majority of its European towers into Vantage Towers. It has also undertaken a consolidation of its European operations in the last couple of years, the most recent being its exit from Italy with the sale of its local business to Swisscom.
