(Bloomberg) -- South Africa’s antitrust tribunal prohibited Vodacom Group Ltd.’s 13.2 billion-rand ($745 million) deal to buy a stake in Remgro Ltd.’s fiber businesses.
The nation’s antitrust regulator — the Competition Commission — plunged the deal into jeopardy last year after it urged the Competition Tribunal to block the acquisition. Vodacom will await the body’s detailed reasons for prohibiting the transaction before considering all options available to it, which may include a request to the Competition Appeal Court, it said in a statement Tuesday.
Remgro is also considering “all alternatives” at its disposal, it said separately.
“South Africa desperately needs additional significant investment, especially in digital infrastructure in lower-income areas,” Vodacom Chief Executive Officer Shameel Joosub said. “Our investment of up to 14 billion rand would have changed millions of lives and created thousands of jobs.”
As part of Vodacom’s deal, the company had planned to invest in fiber rollout in low-income areas, spending 10 billion rand and providing 10,000 jobs, the company said.
African operators are investing in infrastructure as they seek to monetize services offered on their networks, towers and data centers. Wireless carriers expect the continent’s fast-growing, young and increasingly tech-savvy population will turn to their smartphones to access a wide range of services from entertainment to banking and insurance.
Vodacom shares fell 1.1% in Johannesburg to value the company at 232 billion rand. Remgro, part-owned by South African billionaire Johann Rupert, dropped 5.9%, the most since March.
Vodacom had proposed to buy 30% of Maziv — a wholly owned unit of Remgro’s Community Investment Ventures Holdings Ltd. — with an option to increase this to 40%. Maziv’s key operating companies are Dark Fibre Africa and Vumatel, which build and own fiber-optic networks.
The deal carries “clear industrial logic,” John Davies, a senior industry analyst at Bloomberg Industries, wrote in a note.
“Remedies based on open access and menu-based pricing could be enough to convince any appeals to the domestic Competition Appeal Court,” he wrote. “Even if the deal is ultimately unsuccessful, fiber is likely to remain a promising standalone investment.”
--With assistance from Khuleko Siwele.
(Update with comment from Vodacom CEO in fourth paragraph.)
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