German telecommunications company Deutsche Telekom considers selling its operations in Romania, sources in the telecom market told local G4media.ro.

The move is allegedly part of the company’s plan to exit the markets it entered after acquiring Greek company OTE. However, in Romania, the talks about a possible exit of Telekom from the local market intensified after the Government adopted the controversial emergency ordinance OUG 114/2018, also called “the greed tax,” which imposed, among other things, a 3% turnover tax for telecom companies.

It’s not clear at this point whether the Telekom Romania operations will be sold to a player that is already present on the market or to a new player.

Telekom’s potential exit from Romania will also have an impact on the media market, as Telekom has a sports TV channel, which, according to Gazeta Sporturilor, could be purchased by local telecom group RCS&RDS, which also has owns several sports channels.

The Telekom brand has been present in Romania since 2014. The local subsidiary of the German company reported 4.4% lower revenues in the first quarter of this year, amid growth of the customer base for fixed-mobile integrated services and a drop in the number of subscribers for fixed telephony services.

newsroom@romania-insider.com

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