The Walloon cable company VOO will be taken over by Orange Belgium, subsidiary of the French company Orange. Telenet, which was also coveting VOO, has thus missed out. The Flemish telecom company regrets the choice of Orange.
VOO, the Walloon counterpart of Telenet, ends up in French hands. After a year and a half of a sales process in which only Telenet and Orange were in the running, Telenet has now also been dropped. The Flemish telecom company announced this in a press release.
In that announcement, Telenet does not hide its disappointment. Telenet was interested in taking over VOO and wanted to set up an industrial future-proof telco project in Wallonia and Brussels through a takeover,” it sounds.
“Telenet regrets the decision of Nethys NV because a takeover by Telenet would have brought benefits for the overall competitive landscape in Belgium, the Walloon and Brussels industrial project and for VOO as a company.”
Previous sale overturned
Nethys, the current owner of VOO, had already announced its intention to enter into exclusive negotiations with one candidate based on the closing bids of the interested parties.
The Liège intermunicipal company hopes to have a signed contract for the sale of a majority stake in cable operator VOO by the end of the year.
Nethys is the operational arm of the intermunicipal Enodia (formerly Publifin) and had already sold VOO two years ago, to the American investor Providence. Because this had been done in secret, without the knowledge of the Walloon municipalities, the sale was annulled by the Walloon government.
Orange and Telenet were also interested at the time, but both missed the boat. Now Orange is finally doing well at home, while Telenet is missing out.
Voo is the only provider that guarantees 400mbps without fiber in Wallonia.
Curious how this goes.
Bit by bit we privatize and sell Belgium to France.
yeey, less competition, exactly what we need
Wondering if this will benefit the customers wallet considering the following:
Orange now uses the Telenet network in Flanders and complains about the wholesale prices being too high compared to te actual costs of running the coax network (no opinion here whether this is legit or not, I don’t know)
Orange will now be in the position of selling the same service to Telenet, if Telenet wants to operate under a wholesale system in the Walloon region.
IF Telenet wants to do this, Orange will either be able to negotiate lower wholesale prices for themselves, with a possible benefit for the customers wallet, OR they also ask high retail prices (because they can and make shareholders happy, or should because it is indeed expensive – > would be the same as Telenet currents claims), with no benefits to customers.
If Telenet bought VOO there is much less of a possibility for lower prices.
IMO the best would be for networks to be organized at an governmental level, in some kind of non profit situation, although the current similar implementations (infrabel/fluvius) didn’t seem to have a big effect either.
I mean if even VOO ended up in Telenet’s hands just close up the “market” and let them jack up prices every year…
Oh wait they already do that too…
“Telenet betreurt de beslissing van Nethys want een overname door Telenet zou voordelen hebben gebracht voor het algemene concurrentielandschap in België, het Waals en Brussels industrieel project en voor VOO als bedrijf”
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The Walloon cable company VOO will be taken over by Orange Belgium, subsidiary of the French company Orange. Telenet, which was also coveting VOO, has thus missed out. The Flemish telecom company regrets the choice of Orange.
VOO, the Walloon counterpart of Telenet, ends up in French hands. After a year and a half of a sales process in which only Telenet and Orange were in the running, Telenet has now also been dropped. The Flemish telecom company announced this in a press release.
In that announcement, Telenet does not hide its disappointment. Telenet was interested in taking over VOO and wanted to set up an industrial future-proof telco project in Wallonia and Brussels through a takeover,” it sounds.
“Telenet regrets the decision of Nethys NV because a takeover by Telenet would have brought benefits for the overall competitive landscape in Belgium, the Walloon and Brussels industrial project and for VOO as a company.”
Previous sale overturned
Nethys, the current owner of VOO, had already announced its intention to enter into exclusive negotiations with one candidate based on the closing bids of the interested parties.
The Liège intermunicipal company hopes to have a signed contract for the sale of a majority stake in cable operator VOO by the end of the year.
Nethys is the operational arm of the intermunicipal Enodia (formerly Publifin) and had already sold VOO two years ago, to the American investor Providence. Because this had been done in secret, without the knowledge of the Walloon municipalities, the sale was annulled by the Walloon government.
Orange and Telenet were also interested at the time, but both missed the boat. Now Orange is finally doing well at home, while Telenet is missing out.
Translated with http://www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
Voo is the only provider that guarantees 400mbps without fiber in Wallonia.
Curious how this goes.
Bit by bit we privatize and sell Belgium to France.
yeey, less competition, exactly what we need
Wondering if this will benefit the customers wallet considering the following:
Orange now uses the Telenet network in Flanders and complains about the wholesale prices being too high compared to te actual costs of running the coax network (no opinion here whether this is legit or not, I don’t know)
Orange will now be in the position of selling the same service to Telenet, if Telenet wants to operate under a wholesale system in the Walloon region.
IF Telenet wants to do this, Orange will either be able to negotiate lower wholesale prices for themselves, with a possible benefit for the customers wallet, OR they also ask high retail prices (because they can and make shareholders happy, or should because it is indeed expensive – > would be the same as Telenet currents claims), with no benefits to customers.
If Telenet bought VOO there is much less of a possibility for lower prices.
IMO the best would be for networks to be organized at an governmental level, in some kind of non profit situation, although the current similar implementations (infrabel/fluvius) didn’t seem to have a big effect either.
I mean if even VOO ended up in Telenet’s hands just close up the “market” and let them jack up prices every year…
Oh wait they already do that too…
“Telenet betreurt de beslissing van Nethys want een overname door Telenet zou voordelen hebben gebracht voor het algemene concurrentielandschap in België, het Waals en Brussels industrieel project en voor VOO als bedrijf”
Riiiiiiiiiiiiiight….