Atlas Investissement, an investment vehicle of Xavier Niel, has acquired an approximately 2.5% interest in Vodafone Group.
Niel has investments in the telecoms sector in nine countries in Europe with nearly 50 million active subscribers combined and more than €10 billion of revenues. He is the owner of iliad, a leading telecoms provider present in France, Italy and Poland, as well as NJJ Holding, an investor in telecoms assets including Switzerland and Ireland.
Atlas Investissement says it has identified Vodafone as an attractive investment opportunity, as per the quality of its assets portfolio and the solid underlying trends in the global telecommunications sector.
It adds that is supportive of Vodafone’s publicly stated intention to pursue consolidation opportunities in selected geographies, as well as its efforts in infrastructure separation.
Atlas Investissement’s view is that there are opportunities to accelerate both the streamlining of Vodafone’s footprint and the separation of its infrastructure assets, further reduce costs, improve profitability, accelerate broadband development in Germany and other geographies and enhance focus on innovation.
Atlas Investissement concludes by saying that it is independent of iliad Group and iliad Holding.
