BEIJING, May 31 -- Nokia Oyj may get approval from European Union regulators for its 8.1 billion U.S. dollars acquisition of Navteq Corp, the world's largest digital map maker, sources said Friday.
The European Commission expressed no opposition to the merger at a meeting last week, the sources, who requested anonymity because the discussions aren't public, told Bloomberg News.
Regulators found there was robust competition in the market for personal navigation devices, they said.
The case would be the second acquisition of a digital map making company cleared by the EU this year.
Earlier this month regulators approved plans by TomTom NV, Europe's biggest maker of car-navigation devices, to buy Navteq rival Tele Atlas NV for 2.9 billion euros (4.5 billion dollars).
"The reasons to block TomTom-Tele Atlas are the same for Nokia-Navteq," said Richard Windsor, a mobile phone analyst at Nomura Securities in London.
"If they've let through TomTom-Tele Atlas, I can't see why they'd block Nokia-Navteq."
Espoo, Finland-based Nokia, the world's largest mobile-phone maker, agreed to buy Chicago-based Navteq In October to add maps to its products and compete with TomTom and Garmin Ltd.
Nokia expects to hear from the commission by the August 8 deadline, spokesman Kari Tuutti said. He declined to comment further.
Jennifer Schuh, a Navteq spokeswoman, didn't immediately return messages seeking comment. Commission spokesman Jonathan Todd declined to comment.
Shipments up
Global mobile-phone shipments probably will increase 12 percent to 1.26 billion units this year, said Bonny Joy, an analyst at Boston-based researcher Strategy Analytics.
Garmin has predicted that prices for navigation gear will fall by 20 percent this year as competition intensifies and phone makers such as Nokia add navigation to their devices.
The commission, the EU's antitrust regulator in Brussels, is scheduled to rule on the Nokia-Navteq deal by August 8.
Nokia had the largest share of the mobile-phone market in the first quarter with 39.1 percent, compared with Samsung Electronics Co's 14.4 percent and Motorola Inc's 10.2 percent, Stamford, Connecticut-based researcher Gartner Inc said in a statement last Wednesday.
(Source: Shanghaidaily.com)
