Six Million Argentine Mobile Customers Get a New Owner
ARGENTINA · TELECOMS
Key Facts
- —The approval Argentina’s competition authority cleared Metrotel as the buyer of the assets Telecom Argentina must divest.
- —The date 9 September 2026.
- —The scale Around 6 million mobile subscribers, 4 million of them in greater Buenos Aires, plus roughly 200,000 fixed broadband customers.
- —Who Metrotel is An independent operator owned by Riverwood Capital Partners and Blackstone Tactical Opportunities, previously focused on corporate and wholesale connectivity.
- —The condition that matters The divested mobile customers may not be sold on to Claro.
- —Not yet done The price Metrotel pays Telecom has not been settled.
Six million mobile customers are being handed to a wholesale connectivity firm owned by two private equity funds. The price has not been agreed yet.
Argentina’s competition authority approved Metrotel on Wednesday as the buyer of the customer base Telecom Argentina was ordered to divest as a condition of its purchase of Telefonica’s Argentine business.
What Was Approved
The Autoridad Nacional de la Competencia, the reconstituted competition authority whose members were designated in November 2025 with expanded merger powers, cleared Metrotel as the designated acquirer on 9 September.
The assets are roughly 6 million mobile subscribers, about 4 million of them in the Buenos Aires metropolitan area and 2 million across the rest of the country, together with around 200,000 fixed broadband customers on the Movistar brand across 28 localities in five provinces. Radio spectrum and network infrastructure go with them, including a mandatory fibre transfer in Buenos Aires.
What was approved is the identity of the buyer, not the underlying acquisition. Telecom Argentina bought Telefonica Argentina for US$1.245 billion in a transaction agreed in early 2025, and the divestment requirement came with the antitrust clearance of that deal.
Reporting on 9 September notes that the formal administrative act had not yet been published. The resolution number is not yet public.
Who Metrotel Is
Metrotel is not a Telecom subsidiary and not a Telefonica entity. It is an independent operator owned by the investment funds Riverwood Capital Partners and Blackstone Tactical Opportunities Advisors.
Its business until now has been corporate and wholesale connectivity. This transaction would put it into the residential mobile and broadband market for the first time, at a scale of six million customers.
One disclosure belongs in any account of the approval. Metrotel’s chief executive, Sebastián Bardengo, spent five years on Telecom Argentina’s board and executive committee before joining Metrotel in January 2023. That does not make Metrotel a Telecom vehicle, and it is a relationship readers should know about.
The Conditions
The divested mobile customers may not be sold on to Claro, the other large mobile operator. That condition exists to stop the divestment simply reconcentrating the market on a different axis.
Spectrum must be returned under the terms of the original June 2026 approval: 130 MHz in total, 60 MHz nationally, with the remainder going to the secondary market.
Metrotel gets interim access to Telecom’s network while it builds its own, including radio access network sharing, roaming and co-location, with a two-year guaranteed infrastructure access window.
The regulator’s stated objective is to prevent a single group holding around 70 percent of Argentine telecom services. After the divestment the figure is expected to sit closer to 50 percent.
Customers are not obliged to stay with whoever ends up owning their contract. They are free to switch.
What Is Still Open
The price. Telecom and Metrotel had not finalised what Metrotel will pay at the time the approval was reported, which means a regulatory clearance now exists for a transaction whose commercial terms are unsettled.
That ordering is unusual and it is not accidental. Telecom is under an obligation to divest, which weakens its negotiating position, and the approved buyer knows it.
More: Argentina news in English, every day from The Rio Times.
Frequently Asked Questions
What did the regulator approve?
Metrotel as the buyer of the customer base Telecom Argentina must divest after acquiring Telefonica Argentina.
How many customers?
Around 6 million mobile subscribers and roughly 200,000 fixed broadband customers.
Who owns Metrotel?
The investment funds Riverwood Capital Partners and Blackstone Tactical Opportunities Advisors. It is independent of Telecom and Telefonica.
What conditions apply?
The mobile customers cannot be sold on to Claro, spectrum must be returned, and Metrotel gets two years of guaranteed access to Telecom infrastructure.
Is the deal done?
No. The price Metrotel will pay Telecom had not been settled when the approval was reported.
Sources: La Nacion, DPL News, ConverCom, TAVI, Perfil.
This article was drafted with automated assistance and reviewed before publication. How we use AI · Report an error
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