Rumbling of Mergers in Europe

Amidst the talk and challenges of a merger between France Telecom and Deutsche Telekom wireless operations in the U.K. comes the news of a possible tie up between Telecom Italia and Telefonica. Setting aside the political implications, this recent news seems to be another step in the courtship between the two behemoths. Telefonica recently completed the acquisition of HanseNet in Germany. Prior to the acquisition, HanseNet was a part of Telecom Italia's operations in Germany. It will be interesting to follow which portions of Telecom Italia's operations will be up for a merger if one were to actually happen. Coming to the political implications stated earlier, the news publication La Repubblica claims that the Berlusconi family bought into Telefonica late last year. That involves Mediaset now? This is turning out to be quite interesting.