Arqiva, the UK transmission company, faces a tough few weeks of negotiation with the Competition Commission to convince the regulator that it need not sell any of its assets to alleviate competition concerns. The Competition Commission last week listed possible remedies to address the substantial lessening of competition that it identified in the UK transmission market as a result of Arqiva owner Macquarie's acquisition of rival National Grid Wireless. The ￡2.5 billion acquisition, announced in April this year, joined the two major transmission companies in the UK which, according to the Commission, could lead to higher prices and/or lower quality in provision of services and less innovation. While the Commission stated that full divestiture of NGW would address its concerns, it has invited views on whether a partial divestiture could be undertaken to create competition for the provision of network access and managed transmission services for radio and television.
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