Anacom stands against Altice acquiring Media Capital
In the terms of the proposal, the acquisition of Media Capital by Altice should not happen. This is the conclusion sent by the regulator Anacom to the Competition Authority.
Anacom handed in their official opinion to the Portuguese Competition Authority. In a press release, the authority regulating the telecommunications’ sector opposes the conclusion of this acquisition, which was announced in July; the official opinion concerns the concentration operation between MEO and Media Capital.
“ANACOM concluded that the concentration is prone to creating significant setbacks to the effective competition in the different electronic communications’ market, ultimately creating losses for the final consumer, so it should not occur in the terms it was proposed”, can be read in Anacom’s note sent this Monday to the Competition Authority — an opinion which is non-binding.
According to Anacom, the terms proposed for the sale of Media Capital to Altice translate into a “complete vertical integration of the value chain”, since the sale would join under the same group the commercial relations between the production of content, wholesale supply of radio and TV channels, advertising and television service distribution. The authority also refers to the gathering of TVI, Plural, MEO, Sapo, IOL, among others, exceeds the European reference market quota.
