The offer went through: from 14 January Nokia e Alcatel-Lucent they will be able to start operating as a single group, whose total value will be around 25 billion euros. This was communicated by the AMF, the French authority which supervises the markets, specifying that according to preliminary data, the Finnish company would hold around 79% of the capital of the French-American operator.
Last April, in fact, Nokia had launched on the rival a takeover bid, all in actions, from 15,6 billion euros: offer which will be reopened this month in France and the United States and whose final results will be announced in February. The operation is part of the consolidation that is affecting the entire network infrastructure sector.
“We are happy that the offer has been concluded positively – commented the CEO of Nokia, Rajeev Suri – and that Alcatel-Lucent investors share our confidence in the future of the new joint company. We will move quickly to bring the two companies together and implement our integration plans. Effective January 14, 2016, Nokia and Alcatel-Lucent will offer a combined end-to-end portfolio and economies of scope and scale to meet the needs of our global customers. We will have unrivaled R&D and innovation capabilities, which we will use to lead the world in creating next-generation technologies and services.”
The Finnish giant plans to implement a €7 billion program to optimize its capital structure and return excess capital to shareholders (the forecast is around €4 billion).
