UPDATE Orange Romania confirms talks of a technical partnership between Deutsche Telekom and France Telecom on the Romanian market / DT cannot confirm rumours

Orange Romania will benefit directly from the strategic partnerships agreed between France Telecom and Deutsche Telekom and currently the two parties examine the opportunity and type of future synergies, Orange Romania technical director Madalin Suceanu said on Monday. The operator has development partnerships with other local operators, Orange Romania official said.

UPDATEContacted by HotNews.ro, Deutsche Telekom spokesperson Elpida Trizi said that DT cannot confirm the rumours and said that DT “does not actively pursue a network sharing strategy”. She said that DT investigates all opportunities that my increase the quality of services and cut costs but it is not necessarily a top priority.

Orange Romania will continue to develop partnerships in the technical area with other telecom operators in Romania as part of its strategy to develop the network and the services offered to its clients, Suceveanu added. The first steps were made several years ago with the joint use of telecom infrastructure in some areas of the network and involved collaborations with the main players on the Romanian mobile telephony market – Vodafone and Cosmote, she said.

Her declarations follow the information in the German daily Handelsblatt mentioning that Deutsche Telekom and France Telecom plan to combine their networks in Austria and Romania to cut costs.

France Telecom owns in Romania the biggest mobile operator, Orange. Deutsche Telekom owns 30% of the OTE Greek group, the main shareholder of Romtelecom and Cosmote.