The Romanian incumbent telco Romtelecom has signed an agreement with Digital Cable Systems (DCS) to buy the latter’s AKTA Satelit DTH platform.
This is the second deal Romtelecom has signed this month, having earlier agreed to buy Boom TV from the DTH Television Group. If both go through, the total number of DTH platforms in Romania will be effectively reduced from five to three.
The total price of the AKTA deal will depend on the number of subscribers the platform has and Romtelecom has also notified the Competition Council about the takeover, which will only go ahead once it receives its approval.
Romtelecom has also notified the Council about its proposed takeover of Boom TV.
Romtelecom, which is backed by Greek OTE and ultimately Deutsche Telekom, already operates a DTH platform named Dolce that has close to one million subscribers.
DCS, which is backed by AIG, also has a cable business operating under the AKTA name. It had 180,000 subscribers at the end of 2010, while AKTA Satelit claimed 70,000.
Should both deals receive the Competition Council’s approval, Romania’s DTH market will be reduced to platforms operated by UPC (Focus Sat), RCS&RDS (Digi) and Romtelecom.
Significantly, DCS would hold on to its cable interests in a market in which RCS&RDS may soon buy UPC.
