Turkcell submitted an offer to acquire Macedonian Cosmofon

Turkcell submitted an offer to acquire Macedonian Cosmofon

Turkish mobile operator Turkcell has submitted a non-binding offer to acquire Macedonian mobile operator Cosmofon from Hellenic Telecommunications Organisation's (OTE) of Greece, Reuters reports citing Koray Ozturkler, a senior Turkcell official, as saying. Other firms thought to be interested in purchasing the operator include Telekom Austria Telekom Slovenije and Turkish fixed line operator Turk Telekom.

The Greek parent is looking to offload the company for between EUR250-EUR300 million (USD336-USD402 million), following Deutsche Telekom (DT’s) acquisition of a strategic stake in the Greek incumbent. The German giant also controls T-Mobile Macedonia and FYROM competition authorities recently ruled that as Cosmofon and T-Mobile collectively control more than 90% of the domestic mobile market, DT must sell one of them to avoid a monopoly situation arising. The search for a new owner began after the Macedonian Competition Agency released a document stating that the agreement between DT and OTE creates a monopoly on the mobile telephony market.