By Mauro Orru 
 

The European Commission granted conditional approval to the merger between Telecom Italia SpA's Infrastrutture Wireless Italiane SpA and Vodafone Group PLC's Italian tower unit, the commission said in a statement on Friday.

The two companies reached a deal in July 2019 in a move that is expected to facilitate the deployment of 5G at lower costs across a wide geographical area in Italy.

"Fast roll-out of 5G technology in Italy will benefit Italian consumers and businesses. Today we approve the creation of a joint venture between two mobile operators who are planning to combine their telecommunication towers to jointly achieve this objective, without compromising retail and wholesale competition," said Margrethe Vestager, executive vice-president in charge of competition policy.

Conditional approval comes after Telecom Italia and Vodafone agreed to a package of remedies to address competition concerns.

Inwit agreed to provide free space on 4,000 towers in Italian municipalities with more than 35,000 inhabitants where third parties could install, operate, maintain and use their equipment, the European Commission said.

 

Write to Mauro Orru at mauro.orru@wsj.com

 

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

March 06, 2020 12:09 ET (17:09 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2020 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
Vodafone (LSE:VOD)
Gráfica de Acción Histórica
De Feb 2024 a Mar 2024 Haga Click aquí para más Gráficas Vodafone.
Vodafone (LSE:VOD)
Gráfica de Acción Histórica
De Mar 2023 a Mar 2024 Haga Click aquí para más Gráficas Vodafone.