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Phoenix has agreed to legally binding commitments, giving the CCPC confidence to clear the acquisition.
The Irish Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (CCPC) has cleared the way for Phoenix Tower International to acquire Cellnex’s Irish operations.
The acquisition was first announced in March last year, when the US-based Phoenix agreed to pay €971m for Barcelona-headquartered Cellnex’s telecoms infrastructure business in Ireland. Shortly after, the CCPC launched a preliminary probe, followed by an “in-depth” investigation into the deal.
The competition watchdog was concerned that the merger could result in a loss of close competition between the two parties, resulting in higher prices and lower quality of services for the end users.
However, in a bid to boost the CCPC’s confidence in the deal, Phoenix has made a number of legally binding commitments, including to divest from sites where the merger would reduce the number of competitors offering hosting services on macro passive infrastructure from three to two or from two to one.
Passive infrastructure, which includes towers or masts, is crucial for mobile network operators and other electronic communications service providers, with operators fixing active network equipment to it, including antennae and dishes.
Moreover, Phoenix has also committed to divest from new sites in the same areas, where the new sites are part of an existing agreement between the merging businesses and a mobile network operator.
These commitments, the CCPC said on 6 February, will allow a competitor to enter or expand in the market and will replace the competitor which will be lost due to the merger.
The competition watchdog noted that the merger “will not substantially lessen competition”, and has ultimately allowed the deal to go ahead.
Cellnex began operating in Ireland after it acquired telecoms infrastructure company Cignal for €210m in 2019, while Phoenix first entered the Irish market in 2020 when it acquired Eir’s passive infrastructure portfolio.
Both businesses operate passive telecoms infrastructure, with Phoenix owning approximately 25,000 wireless infrastructure sites across Latin America, the Caribbean, Europe and the US.
Since acquiring Cignal, Cellnex has been very active in the Irish State, from rolling out an IoT network in 2022 to tackling rural mobile blackspots through a community-led scheme. In early 2023, the company partnered with Dublin City University to improve 5G coverage across the university’s campuses.
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