A Polish telecoms executive says the planned acquisition of Multimedia Polska by rival firm UPC Poland is unlikely to have a major impact on the country’s cable market. Jerzy Straszewski, president of the Polish Chamber of Electronic Communications (PIKE), is quoted by Broadband TV News as saying that the deal will in fact strengthen the competitive environment by creating a stronger challenger to broadband market leader Orange Polska. Straszewski added that he expects the UPC-Multimedia deal to receive the approval of the Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (Urzad Ochrony Konkurencji i Konsumentow, UOKiK) shortly.
Liberty Global subsidiary UPC first announced its planned PLN3 billion (USD760 million) takeover of Multimedia in October 2016. According to TeleGeography’s GlobalComms Database, UPC is the largest cable broadband provider and second largest ISP overall in Poland, while Multimedia is the third largest cableco in subscriber terms and lies fifth in the broadband sector overall.