PARIS--France's competition authority on Thursday raided several
offices of mobile and broadband operator SFR-Numericable over
concerns that the company might have breached merger rules,
according to people familiar with the matter.
France's Autorité de la Concurrence searched the offices after
rival Bouygues Telecom raised concerns with the competition
authority over whether Numericable and SFR began working together
on commercial offers before they received the official green light
from the antitrust body, the people familiar with the matter
said.
The competition authority confirmed that it was conducting a
raid "in the telecommunications sector," but declined to comment
further.
The raid comes a few months after mobile company SFR and cable
operator Numericable officially merged following a takeover battle
between Numericable's owner, cable tycoon Patrick Drahi, and the
owner of Bouygues Telecom, Bouyuges SA .
Mr. Drahi won the takeover fight and paid EUR17 billion ($18.3
billion) to buy SFR, a move that left France with four mobile
operators in an intensely competitive market. French telecom
companies have suffered sales declines since the arrival of a
fourth mobile company, Iliad SA, three years ago. Bouygues Telecom,
which had suffered particularly hard in the price war sparked by
Iliad's ultracheap offers, wanted to merge with SFR to cut the
number of mobile firms in France back to three.
Bouygues Telecom in November last year addressed a letter to the
competition authority stating that it believed Mr. Drahi already
controlled decisions at SFR before the competition authority
approved the merger in late November, the people said. In the
letter, Bouygues Telecom said it believed teams from the two
companies might have worked on a new set-top box ahead of the
merger approval, the people added.
SFR-Numericable on Thursday informed its employees that
officials from the antitrust watchdog have sealed off certain
offices as part of an investigation, according to an email to staff
reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.
A dozen officers from the antitrust body were searching through
documents and computers at the group's headquarters north east of
Paris and in Numericable offices in a suburb east of the capital,
one of the people familiar with the matter said.
Write to Ruth Bender at Ruth.Bender@wsj.com
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