Sawiris looking at SFR

Egyptian billionaire telecoms investor Naguib Sawiris is interested in acquiring Vivendi-owned telco and IPTV provider SFR.

Sawiris told the Financial Times that one of his subsidiaries was looking into acquiring the French telco. Vivendi has been engaged in a review of its structure that could lead to the sale or spin-off of one or more of its three telecom subsidiaries: SFR, Maroc Telecom and GVT in Brazil.

Vivendi has mulled a number of options for SFR, including a merger with cable operator Numericable and a fusion with Vodafone. The company was reported to be holding talks with Numericable’s owners Altice, Cinven and Carlyle Group last month with a view to combining SFR’s mobile network with Numericable’s fixed infrastructure.

Sawiris recently offered to back a Telecom Italia rights issue that enable the Italian telcos to pay down its debts and expand its operations in Latin America.