Nokia offers to buy Comptel for US $370mn

REUTERS: Finnish telecoms network equipment maker Nokia said yesterday it is seeking to buy company Comptel for about 347 million euros (US $370 million) to expand its software services business.
Nokia and its rivals, Sweden’s Ericsson and China’s Huawei have struggled recently as demand for faster 4G mobile broadband equipment has peaked and the move to the next-generation 5G networks are still years away.
Nokia said its customers were now turning to software to make their networks more intelligent.
“The planned acquisition is part of Nokia’s strategy to build a standalone software business at scale by expanding and strengthening its software portfolio and go-to-market capabilities with additional sales capacity and a strategic partner network,” Nokia said in a statement.
The cash offer, 3.04 euros per share, represents a premium of 29 percent compared with Comptel’s last closing price.
Comptel, which had sales of about 100 million euros in 2016, said its board of directors, and shareholders that hold about 48 percent of the shares backed the offer.
Last year, Nokia bought Franco-American group Alcatel-Lucent in a 15.6 billion-euro all-share deal and is cutting thousands of jobs as it seeks to reduce annual costs by 1.2 billion euros.