Cerha Hempel's Budapest office has helped set-up a new company – Cetin Hungary – by way of a de-merger from Telenor Hungary.
The newly formed network infrastructure service company purchased the assets of Telenor Common Operation and started operating on July 1, 2020. According to a Telenor press release, "this is part of the regional project of the Czech PPF Group, the owner of Telenor companies in the CEE region and the majority owner of Telenor Hungary, aiming to further strengthen its strategic telecommunications investment in Bulgaria and Serbia, as well as in Hungary."
According to that press release, "separating active and passive infrastructure from mobile consumer retail will enable Cetin Hungary to maximize commercial opportunities, exploit the improved potential for wholesale partnerships and create technological infrastructure synergies within the Cetin Group, while extensive, 24/7 supervised networks, including active and passive elements, IT infrastructure and cybersecurity services will enable provisioning of superior voice, data, and other telecommunications services by Telenor Hungary and also to other wholesale customers."
In 2015, Telenor Hungary’s majority shareholder, the PPF Telecom Group, successfully completed a similar transaction in the Czech Republic. Together with their Czech counterpart, the newly founded three CETIN companies will become the telecommunication infrastructure backbone of the PPF Group in CEE.
Cetin Hungary's management is led by CEO Tamas Otvos, with Balazs Toth, who joined Telenor Common Operation in April as Legal Director in Hungary — as reported by CEE Legal Matters on April 28, 2020 — serving as Legal & Compliance Director.
Cerha Hempel's team consisted of Partners Zita Albert and Andrea Presser and Associate Roland Szebenyi.
According to Albert, "the challenge from a legal perspective on this transaction was the novelty of Cetin representing the first telecommunication service provider company in Hungary."
