The acquisition of Moscow-based Akado by ER Telecom now looks unlikely to take place.
According to Vedomosti, talks between the two parties have ground to a halt, with the major stumbling block appearing to be the stance being the negative stance to the proposed deal being taken by the Moscow city authorities.
This will be a major blow to ER Telecom, which is the country’ second largest provider of broadband internet, as well as one of its leading cable operators, with around 2.6 million and 2.5 million subscribers respectively.
It has been keen to enter the lucrative Moscow market, where Akado is a key player.
In total, the latter had 1.1 million TV and over 800,000 broadband internet subscribers in Moscow, St Petersburg and Yekaterinberg as of H1 this year.
Akado has now been on the market for over three years and in that time attracted interest from a host of Russian companies including Svyzinvest and MTS.
