{"id":50873,"date":"2013-12-12T13:48:41","date_gmt":"2013-12-12T11:48:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=50873"},"modified":"2013-12-13T08:56:11","modified_gmt":"2013-12-13T06:56:11","slug":"mtn-telkom-talk-rumours-re-emerge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/mobile\/50873\/mtn-telkom-talk-rumours-re-emerge\/","title":{"rendered":"MTN Telkom talk rumours re-emerge"},"content":{"rendered":"

MTN Group<\/a> is believed to be in discussion with Telkom<\/a> regarding the sharing of infrastructure, according to a report from Bloomberg<\/a>, citing “two people familiar with the matter”.<\/p>\n

The report is light on detail, however it notes that the discussions are around Telkom’s mobile unit.<\/p>\n

Sipho Maseko<\/a>, Group CEO at Telkom, recently admitted\u00a0that the Telkom Mobile business is going through \u201ca very difficult time\u201d, and is in discussions with\u00a0parties over future operations.<\/p>\n

According to Bloomberg,\u00a0Nik Kershaw<\/a>, an MTN spokesman, declined to comment.<\/p>\n

Telkom told BusinessTech: \u201cAs communicated at Telkom\u2019s Interim Results announcement, there are discussions with various parties regarding Telkom Mobile.\u201d<\/p>\n

When rumours of \u00a0a discussion between MTN and Telkom first surfaced in November, MTN told BusinessTech\u00a0that, while it does\u00a0engage with\u00a0Telkom as part of normal business practice, it would not speculate on a possible deal with Telkom Mobile.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn response to the recent speculation in the press around MTN and Telkom, in accordance with good governance, MTN does not comment on market rumour and speculation,\u201d the group said in a statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cHowever, we note that as part of normal business practice MTN engages with companies such as Telkom on matters such as roaming agreements and leased lines and we continue to do this,\u201d\u00a0Eben Albertyn<\/a>, chief technology officer at MTN SA said.<\/p>\n

Bloomberg said that Telkom had held earlier talks with Vodacom about sharing infrastructure, citing “one of the people”.<\/p>\n

Acting\u00a0Cell C<\/a>\u00a0CEO, Jose Dos Santos<\/a>, also recently hinted at a possible consolidation\u00a0between two of South Africa\u2019s newest mobile entrants.<\/p>\n

Asked by\u00a0BusinesTech whether\u00a0Cell C is currently in discussions with Telkom Mobile<\/a> over a merger,\u00a0Dos Santos, Cell C chief commercial officer, and Acting CEO said:\u00a0\u201cMarket consolidation is inevitable. Consolidation will help smaller operators build scale to compete more effectively with players that have significant market power.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is likely to be some form of consolidation or partnership in the industry. However, any decisions on consolidation or future partnerships involving Cell C would be for our shareholders to decide upon.\u201d<\/p>\n

More on MTN and Telkom<\/h3>\n

MTN mum on Telkom Mobile talks<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Telkom and MTN in talks: report<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Cell C hints at Telkom Mobile merger<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Telkom in talks over mobile arm<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Telkom dismisses Cell C merger talks<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MTN Group is believed to be in discussion with Telkom regarding the sharing of infrastructure.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":7402,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[42,26,28,2414,65,27],"class_list":["post-50873","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mobile","tag-cell-c","tag-headline","tag-mtn","tag-sipho-maseko","tag-telkom","tag-vodacom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50873","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50873"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50873\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":50926,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50873\/revisions\/50926"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7402"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50873"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50873"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50873"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}