Dutch cable operator Ziggo is seeking as much as €1.5 billion in a share sale, according to Bloomberg, in order to launch its own a mobile telephony service that may stoke a price war in one of Europe’s most competitive markets.
Dutch telecoms regulator OPTA has allocated 100,000 telephone numbers, which Ziggo must start to offer at the beginning of 2012. Ziggo won a licence, in a joint venture with UPC called Ziggo 4, to launch LTE mobile services in the country.
The move is part of increased competition between the nation’s incumbent telecoms operator KPN, who is making big inroads in the Dutch television market with its DTT service Digitenne and IPTV platform KPN Interactieve TV.
At the moment, cable operators are winning fixed line customers from KPN for their brooadband and telephony services. However, mobile telephony is not part of the cablers’ offer – a situation which is now set to change.
