Bouygues Telecom, Iliad and Orange agreed to acquire Altice France’s SFR for €20.35 billion and split its assets and customers among them.
The deal would leave Bouygues with the largest share. If it closes, France would move from four mobile operators to three.
Deal terms and timing
The parties signed a memorandum of understanding on Saturday. The sale could close in the second half of 2027, subject to regulatory approvals, and the parties said there is no certainty that it will go ahead.
Under the indicative offer made in April, Bouygues would pay 42% of the agreed price, while Iliad and Orange would pay 31% and 27%. That split could still change by closing, depending on customer numbers.
The consortium has been in exclusive talks since mid-April. In October last year, it made an initial €17 billion offer that Altice rejected. Altice founder Patrick Drahi had earlier said he hoped the sale of SFR could be valued at around €30 billion, including debt.
What each operator gets
Bouygues is set to acquire SFR Business and customers, part of SFR’s consumer unit, the Crozon rural network, infrastructure for fixed B2B services, SFR’s share of the Faber fiber network, and part of its store network. Bouygues Telecom CEO Benoît Torloting said the transaction would enable the company to become the number two telecommunications operator in France.
Iliad is set to take on SFR’s Red brand with 6 million customers, part of SFR’s consumer business that includes 1.6 million subscribers and 400,000 small business customers, and 50MHz of spectrum across several frequency bands. The addition would bring Iliad’s customer base to nearly 31 million.
Orange will gain 4.9 million customers from part of SFR’s consumer activities, as well as the MVNOs Régio, Syma and Coriolis.
Labor and regulatory pressure
The consortium members agreed to employ all SFR staff until the start of 2029 and to engage with employee representative groups during the process.
Analyst Kester Mann of CCS Insight said the deal could be the greatest shake-up in the French telecom sector since Iliad launched as a fourth mobile operator in 2012. He said competition authorities will be the biggest challenge and that the regulatory outlook looks more favorable for consolidation than it did several years ago.
Mann said a lengthy regulatory review is likely, but approval is likely.
What this means for French mobile operators
The deal would reduce the French mobile market from four operators to three if regulators approve it. That would make it a benchmark test for in-market consolidation in Europe after the UK formed VodafoneThree and Spain formed MasOrange.