Orange Group, Bouygues Telecom, and Iliad Group have entered exclusive talks to snap up Altice’s mobile unit SFR for €20.35 billion ($24bn).

The offer is improved from the previous one put forward to Altice Group in October, when Altice owner Patrick Drahi immediately rejected a €17bn ($20bn) offer from the three telcos.

Following that offer, the trio have come back in their efforts to acquire SFR, as parent company Altice looks to sell off key assets to ease its debt. SFR has around 26 million mobile customers across France.

Altice has granted an exclusivity period to the consortium until May 15, 2026, in order to finalize the terms and the transaction documents.

If the deal is agreed, it would see France’s telecoms market slim down to three mobile carriers from four. This is something that has been seen in other European markets, including the UK and Spain (until Digi becomes the fourth carrier).

Orange CEO Christel Heydemann has previously suggested the carrier was interested in making a move for SFR, stating “a need for consolidation.”

Who gets what?

The consortium notes that today’s (April 17) offer covers the acquisition of the majority of assets operated by Altice France-SFR, excluding shareholdings in ACS/Intelcia, XP Fibre, data center firm Ultraedge, and Altice Technical Services, plus Altice France group’s operations in the French overseas departments and regions.

Explaining how the assets will be split between Bouygues Telecom, the Free–iliad Group, and Orange, the consortium said the B2B business and customers would be taken over by Bouygues Telecom, while the B2C business and customers would be shared between all three.

Beyond this, the other assets and resources (in particular infrastructure and spectrum) would be shared between Bouygues Telecom, the Free–Iliad Group, and Orange, except for SFR’s mobile network in less densely populated areas, which would be taken over by Bouygues Telecom.

In total, the split of price and value would be around 42 percent for Bouygues Telecom, 31 percent for the Free–iliad Group, and 27 percent for Orange.

Whether the current offer is accepted remains to be seen. It was reported last year that Drahi wants closer to €30bn ($35bn) for SFR.

The timing of the offer comes shortly after Altice shortlisted four bidders for a controlling stake in French fiber company XpFibre, in which Altice currently owns a majority stake of 50.01 percent. Initial offers from the shortlisted bidders value XpFibre at around €8 billion ($9.4 billion), including debt.

Altice has sold a number of key assets in the last couple of years, including its 24.5 percent stake in UK telecoms giant BT to Bharti Airtel, in a deal estimated to be worth about $4bn at the time. Drahi only increased Altice UK’s stake in BT to 24.5 percent in May 2023, and even had plans to increase it to nearly 30 percent.

However, after years of acquisitions, the company has been looking to shift assets in order to pay down its mounting debt.

The company is open to selling its telecoms business and recently spun off its French data center assets, forming a new company with more than 250 facilities in France, which were then sold to Morgan Stanley.

Altice has been in talks over a deal to sell its Portuguese mobile unit, and has separately looked to sell off its data center unit in the country.