O2 and Virgin Media may continue their € 31 billion merger after competition authorities find no reason to block the deal. Parent companies Telefónica and Liberty Global expected to complete the deal by mid-2021, but had to await the outcome of an investigation by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) launched late last year. The watchdog was not concerned with reducing retail competition given Virgin Media's relatively small mobile customer base, but rather the potential impact of the merger on the wholesale market. Virgin Media is the second largest provider of backhaul services for mobile operators after Openreach and fears were that the extended entity might be tempted to withhold or reduce the quality of service provided to its competitors, or increase prices, to protect its your competitors. own interests. If competitors were to pass on these additional costs to customers, their price would be less attractive than the rates offered by the joint venture. However, the AMC has tentatively concluded that a substantial drop in competition is unlikely. He said backhaul is a small fraction of operator costs so O2-Virgin Media is unlikely to raise prices enough to hurt competition, while the presence of Openreach and other players in the market means that you would lose business if you did. . "Given the impact this deal could have in the UK, we needed to take a close look at this merger," said Martin Coleman, chairman of AMC's committee of inquiry. “A thorough analysis of the evidence collected during our Phase 2 investigation showed that the deal is unlikely to result in higher prices or lower quality of mobile services, which means customers should continue to benefit from strong competition. ”. The combination of O2's mobile infrastructure and Virgin Media's cable network would immediately create one of the largest telecommunications organizations in Europe, powering communications for almost 40 million subscribers. Consolidation would also result in savings of € 6.2 billion and provide the scale and capacity to compete with BT and Vodafone in converged network services. Parent companies Liberty Global and Telefónica have pledged to create 4.000 jobs and 1.000 apprenticeships if they receive regulatory approval and have pledged to increase the combined company's gigabit broadband footprint by an additional one million installations, raising the total figure to 16 million, within 12 months after the merger. There are also promises to add an additional seven million homes to "gigabit networks" and cover more than 100 cities by the end of 2021. "Liberty Global and Telefónica take note of CMA's publication of its interim findings as part of its review of the proposed merger of its UK operations," the two companies said in a joint statement. "We continue to work constructively with the CMA to achieve a positive outcome and anticipate a close in the middle of this year."