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STC has filed the highest bid for Altice Portugal: Saudi Telecom Co. (STC), the kingdom’s largest telecoms operator, has reportedly submitted the highest binding offer to acquire Altice Portugal, the largest telecom service provider in Portugal, Bloomberg reported on Friday, citing sources close to the matter.
The bid places STC at the forefront of a race against other potential suitors, the sources said. Altice has asked other potential bidders to revise their proposals in light of STC’s offer, they said. Other bidders seem reluctant to do so, the business information service adds.
BACKGROUND- Interest from STC, which is 64% owned by the Public Investment Fund, and others come as Israeli b’naire Patrick Drahi looks to sell shares in a bid to pay down debt.
Drahi was hoping to bag a lofty EUR 10 bn from the sale, a price tag scared off most potential buyers. Bloomberg suggests that concerns over non-EU foreign ownership could be an obstacle to STC’s bid.
STC’s strategy: The mobile network giant has been pushing into Europe of late. It grabbed a 9.9% stake in Spain’s Telefonica in September to become the telecom giant’s top shareholder. The move came a few months after its subsidiary Tawal, a leading integrated ICT infrastructure company in the MENA region, agreed to buy mobile tower infrastructure in Bulgaria, Croatia, and Slovenia worth EUR 1.2 bn from United Group.
Trouble for Altice: French prosecutors opened on Friday an investigation into alleged corruption linked to the Portuguese telecom operator, Bloomberg reported. The probe comes months after Altice co-founder Armando Pereira and others were arrested in Portugal over alleged corruption, tax fraud and others. He was released on a EUR 10 mn bail.
