As US hedge fund Davidson Kempner exits, Niel is making good his promise of owning Irish incumbent Eir shares until the day he dies
French telecom entrepreneur Xavier Niel has tightened his grip on Irish incumbent Eir after a US hedge fund Davidson Kempner sold its 8.9 per cent stake in the business in three tranches between last September and this February to the group’s ultimate holding company, Carraun Telecom. As Mobile Europe reported in October, Niel had started on a trajectory towards full ownership of Eir, as two US hedge funds began to exit their investment in Eir.
NJJ Boru, a company controlled by Niel and his company Iliad, now owns more than 70 percent of Eir alongside US private equity firm Anchorage Capital. Niel has previously been on record stating it was his intention to buy out Anchorage at some stage. Davidson Kempner is exiting with a smile on its face – according to the Sunday Times, in the two years to the end of 2022, both it and Anchorage shared in €1.22 billion of dividend payments from Carraun on foot of payouts received from Eir. The telco has paid out more than €2 billion in dividends to its owners since Niel led a takeover in April 2018.
Eir last week reported revenues up 2% to €1.33 billion for the full year with EBITDA up 4% to €614 million. The telco said that 1.3 million premises are now passed by its fibre to the home (FTTH) network, up 17% on 2023, while a total of 2.2 million premises are passed by its combined FTTH and FTTC (fibre to the cabinet) networks, or 95% of premises in Ireland.
Eir said it has 886,000 fibre broadband connections, up 2% on 2023 and adding up to 94% of its total broadband base. In its results presentation, it pointed out that 56% of customers have triple or quad-play bundles. The telco also said it has a total of 1.5 million mobile customers, up 6% on the previous year. 1.2 million of these are postpaid customers. According to regulator ComReg, it had a 39 percent market share of the Irish retail and wholesale fixed-line market for the quarter ended 30 September, based on revenue.
In 2017, Niel announced he was buying 32.9 percent of Eir through NJJ, his private holding company, while Iliad would own 31.6 percent – at the time, valuing the company at around €3.5 billion. As part of the deal, Iliad had the option to take control of the Irish operator through a call option, granted by NJJ, which was exercisable in 2024. Niel now owns telecoms businesses in 23 countries with more than 110 million subscribers.
