The European Commission has given its approval for Vodafone Group's acquisition of Cable & Wireless Worldwide (CWW) for £1.04 billion.
The Commission found that the transaction will raise no competition concerns as the parties' activities are largely complementary.
CWW's main activity is related to fixed telecoms, whereas Vodafone is mainly focused on mobile telecoms.
CWW owns the UK's largest fiber network for business users, and an international cable network spanning approximately 425,000 kilometers.
The acquisition will make Vodafone the second largest telecoms business in the UK, after BT.
“Vodafone and CWW's activities overlap in a number of markets in the fixed and mobile telecommunications markets in the UK. However, the Commission found that the impact of the transaction on these markets is likely to be small as the combined entity would continue to face significant competition from other market players post-transaction,” the EC said in a statement.
The deal will give Vodafone a comprehensive fixed network in the UK and across Europe, allowing the company to sell bundled fixed and mobile services.
This is key to Vodafone ramping up its enterprise business.
Analyst firm Frost & Sullivan said that CWW's service offerings for both integrated communications and data hosting will allow Vodafone Global Enterprise, the mobile service provider's business services division, to compete with some of the leading fixed-line players, such as the Orange and Telefonica partnership.
“Following Vodafone’s news that it has plans to dispose of non-core assets, such as the latest announcement in May about Gateway Communications in South Africa, we believe Vodafone is signalling its ambitions to capture all related digitalisation services around enterprises,” said Yiru Zhong, senior industry analyst for the ICT group at Frost & Sullivan.
The acquisition will also strengthen Vodafone's machine-to-machine (M2M) communication offering. M2M allows electronic devices to communicate with one another via SIM cards that can connect to wireless sensors and the mobile internet for management and monitoring, and to provide services.
“With entrenched M2M and vertical strategies, Vodafone further demonstrates commitment to tap into future M2M and smart opportunities,” said Zhong. “Vodafone’s core services around mobility and now enterprise communications put them in front of competition for connectivity partnership.
“The market for M2M and smart industries now looks even more dynamic as specialist players also have a good choice of communications partners with whom to go to market together,” added Zhong.
CWW was created in November 2009 when Cable and Wireless announced its intention to separate its Communications and Worldwide business units. Last year, ex-Vodafone executive Gavin Darby took over as CWW's CEO.
Nokia and Namco Bandai bring arcade classics to Asha Touch line - engadget
Published July 5, 2012 | By Nokia - Press Release
Nokia brings classic arcade games to Asha Touch
PAC-MAN® and Final Fantasy headline 22 vintage games delivered by partner NAMCO BANDAI Games Inc.
Espoo, Finland, Tokyo, Japan and Cypress, California, USA - Nokia has today announced NAMCO BANDAI will fully support the recently launched Asha Touch devices, having more than 20 arcade classic titles available to be downloaded through Nokia Store. The new devices were launched just last month and bring a colourful range of great experiences designed for young, urban and aspirational consumers.
Available through Nokia Store as of today, the agreement includes some of the most prestigious titles in the gaming industry, such as PAC-MAN®, Final Fantasy, ACE COMBAT® and Flight Control. Consumers will be able to take advantage of a new touch screen experience that makes mobile web browsing fast, with easy access to social networks and, of course, a great gaming performance.
In total, 22 will be coming on Asha Touch devices from NAMCO BANDAI Games Inc and NAMCO BANDAI Games Americas Inc. including the classics:
- PAC-MAN®RIDGE RACER Drift
- Flight Control
- SOULCALIBUR®
- ACE COMBAT NORTHERN WINGS(TM)
- Final Fantasy
- RIDGE RACER® Drift
- BRAIN EXERCISE(TM) with Dr. Kawashima
- GALAGA® Special Edition
These titles are priced between USD 0.99 and USD 2.99. Mobile gaming fans in more than 52 countries will be able to purchase titles without the need for a credit card, via Nokia's extensive direct billing agreements with over 145 operators.
James Kucera, head of mobile for NAMCO BANDAI Games America Inc., said: "Our partnership with Nokia perfectly illustrates the strengths of our brand's experience and leadership in the mobile games industry and fits our mutual resolve to bring games to all mobile users worldwide"
These latest phones have been designed to provide an incredibly rich, smartphone-like experience to consumers who want to be set free from excessive data consumption costs and short battery life. The devices offer a new, fully re-designed touch user interface, combining the proven ease-of-use from Nokia's heritage with digital design innovations specifically fit for the purpose.
The beautifully crafted Nokia Asha 311 is a fast and fluid 3.5G capacitive touchscreen device, powered by a 1GHz processor to provide a great internet experience. The bright and edgy Nokia Asha 305 is a fun and affordable phone, featuring the exclusive Easy Swap dual SIM. Its sister, the Nokia Asha 306, is a single SIM model, and becomes Nokia's most affordable Wi-Fi handset to date.
Nokia Store has just broken the 5 billion downloads landmark. From January to April, 42% of all content downloaded from Nokia Store was delivered to Asha and other Nokia devices based on the Java ecosystem. Just one year ago, that number was 10%. To date, more than 411 Nokia developers have with apps which have achieved more than 1 million downloads, while India Games, Pico Brothers and Inode have all driven more than 100 million downloads.
Images from NAMCO BANDAI Games Inc, NAMCO BANDAI Games Americas Inc. and Nokia Asha Touch devices are available at http://press.nokia.com.
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