Telenet signs agreements with MEDIALAAN in connection with acquisition of BASE Company
The enclosed information constitutes regulated information as defined in the Royal Decree of 14 November 2007 regarding the duties of issuers of financial instruments which have been admitted for trading on a regulated market.
Agreement with MEDIALAAN for BASE Company's sale of all JIM Mobile customers and its 50% stake in Viking Co NV, the entity behind the 'Mobile Vikings' brand in Belgium. The agreements are conditional on competition authorities' approval.
- Telenet has today announced a new step in the acquisition process of BASE Company as it confirms that it has entered into agreements in the context of the European Commission's ongoing investigation of the proposed acquisition of BASE.
Telenet has signed an agreement with MEDIALAAN NV to transfer over time the entire JIM Mobile customer base to MEDIALAAN. The JIM Mobile products are currently sold under a 'branded partner' agreement that BASE Company and MEDIALAAN signed in 2010, whereby MEDIALAAN is responsible for the marketing of the JIM Mobile products and BASE Company for all other aspects of the mobile product. Following Telenet's acquisition of BASE Company, the 'branded partner' agreement would still continue for some time, but BASE Company would transfer, within a period of maximum two years, the JIM Mobile customers to MEDIALAAN, who would then become a 'full MVNO' player on the BASE network.
In addition Telenet would also sell the existing 50% BASE Company participation in VikingCo NV, the entity behind the 'Mobile Vikings' brand in Belgium, to MEDIALAAN. VikingCo is currently operating as a so-called 'light MVNO' on the BASE Company network. MEDIALAAN will also acquire control over the other 50% shares of VikingCo and thereby acquire the Mobile Vikings customers. It is the intention that MEDIALAAN shall also become a 'full MVNO' player on the BASE network with respect to this customer base within the above timeframe.
Both agreements create the platform for MEDIALAAN to become a new, high-performance MVNO player.
The conditional agreements with MEDIALAAN are subject to the approval of Telenet's acquisition of BASE Company by the European Commission and the approval by the Belgian Competition Authority of Medialaan's acquisition of VikingCo NV and the JIM Mobile customer base.
In April 2015, Telenet announced the signing of a definitive agreement for the acquisition of BASE Company. The transaction was reported to the European Commission by Liberty Global (as Telenet's majority shareholder) on 17 August 2015.
For the time being, customers of Telenet, JIM Mobile, Mobile Vikings and BASE itself are not affected.
