The BT Group has finally gained clearance from the British Competition and Markets Authority to go ahead with its deal of acquiring the German-French mobile joint venture, EE Limited.
Despite agitated noises from competition, the authority stood its grounds when it passed its final verdict without any conditions. According to BBC News, CMA's John Wotton conveyed that the union of the two companies is conflict-free when he stated: "The evidence does not show that this merger is likely to cause significant harm to competition or the interests of consumers."
This £12.5 billion ($17.95 billion) deal is now ready to be implemented, which opens the door for BT to the 31 million customer base of UK's largest mobile operator and internet service provider. In return, as per previously set conditions, the sellers would get the following compensation: Germany's Deutsche Telekom - a 12% stake, along with a seat on the board, and a small cash payment; and France's Orange S.A. - a 4% stake and £3.4 billion in cash - reports The New York Times.
BT's CEO Gavin Patterson expressed his positive thoughts with ""The combined BT and EE will be a digital champion for the UK, providing high levels of investment and driving innovation in a highly competitive market." The takeover has resulted into an amalgamation of two huge customer bases, shows Mirror: EE's 35 million alongside BT's 7.5 million broadband users, 9.5 million telephone customers and 1 million TV customers.
With a huge market at their disposal, BT also needs to up their game to retain its users. 'Bundled' services would definitely be an area the company can do much with. It can refrain its customers to switch over to another provider by creating value-for-money packages of mobile, home telephone, the internet and TV services. Throwing in some freebies with the deals would win an additional brownie point. However, such package deals are often deceptive as the customers can easily lose track of exactly how much money they are paying for each service. Another area of focus should be the customer service department to maintain quality, given now EE's customers are considered as BT's.
Many experts have come out with their views and suggestions over the manifestations of this takeover, and the gist of their analyses can be summed up in the words of Dominic Baliszewski from Broadbandchoices.co.uk - "BT will likely offer some very attractive customer retention deals but it is always worth taking the time to compare and understand what you need versus what you want - especially in an increasingly complicated market."
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