Representatives of True Corporation and the Total Access Communication Company have been separately invited by the Office of the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC), Thailand’s telecom regulator, to clarify media reports of a potential merger of True and DTAC.
Informed sources said that executives of Total Access Communications are scheduled to meet with the regulatory body on Monday, followed by True Corp on the following day.
According to the sources, the NBTC would like clarifications from both mobile phone service providers about the implications of the reported merger on the telecom industry in Thailand and whether it would be in compliance with antitrust regulations, to prevent complete control of the market by a single player.
Norway-based Telenor said, in a statement issued last week, that it is in talks with Thailand’s Charoen Pokphand Group (CP) to explore a merger of their telecom units in Thailand, Telenor’s DTAC and CP Group’s True.
According to a credit analyst at Danske Bank, the merger, if approved by Thai regulators, will give the combined entity of True and DTAC a domestic market share of about 52%, compared to the current leader AIS, which has around 44%.
Both True and DTAC have already reached out to the Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET) to inform them of the merger talks.
