LITTLE ROCK, Ark.-Alltel Corp. said it completed the sale of its Ireland-based Meteor Mobile Communications Ltd. business to a subsidiary of fixed-line telecommunications provider Eircom Group plc. for $500 million.
The sale was originally announced in late July ahead of Alltel’s $6 billion acquisition of Western Wireless Corp., which included Western Wireless’ numerous international operations. Alltel announced in mid-August that it planned to sell its Austrian business Tele.ring Telekom Service GmbH to Deutsche Telekom AG subsidiary T-Mobile Austria GmbH for $1.6 billion.
Alltel still has wireless interests in several other countries, including Slovenia, Georgia, Bolivia, Haiti, Ghana and Cote d’ Ivoire.
Published reports also recently noted that Alltel was nearing a deal to sell off its domestic wireline operations for approximately $10 billion. Analysts noted that the most likely buyers include CenturyTel Inc., Citizens Communications Co. and Valor Communications Group Inc.
Alltel’s wireless revenues account for nearly 70 percent of the company’s total revenues, which should approach nearly $10 billion per year, following its acquisition of Western Wireless.
