Telefonica’s proposed takeover of Spanish pay-TV platform Digital+ could fall through due to the strict conditions imposed by Spain’s communications regulator CNMC, reports website El Confidencial. In May Telefonica announced that it had agreed to purchase the 56 percent stake in Digital+ owned by Prisa for EUR 750 million before subsequently agreeing to acquire Mediaset’s 22 percent stake in Digital+ for an initial EUR 295 million. However, according to sources close to the matter, the CNMC is likely to require Telefonica to open up the content of Digital+ to rivals such as Vodafone-Ono and Orange. The regulator may even ask Telefonica to create prepared channel packages to be resold by others, and that the content may even include that broadcast via fibre as well as satellite, which is likely to cause Telefonica to lose interest in the deal.
The acquisition of Digital+ would bring with it a large customer base in the form of the 1.6 million subscribers to pay-TV channel Canal+ and give Telefonica access to Prisa’s TV catalogue, including its rights to live Spanish football games. Telefonica’s rivals and the European Commission itself have already called on the CNMC to impose tough approval conditions on the proposed merger, which they said would give Telefonica control of 80 percent of Spain’s pay-TV market.
