Spanish fund Asterion buys Irideos in Italian connectivity deal

MILAN (Reuters) - Spanish investment firm Asterion said on Monday it has bought Italian digital infrastructure firm Irideos and aims to combine it with its recently acquired unit Retelit to create a connectivity provider across Italy.

Asterion said it bought 78.4% of Irideos from Italian infrastructure fund F2i. It did not disclose the value of the deal but two people close to the matter said the transaction valued Irideos at around 400 million euros ($406 million).

"Asterion aims to consolidate Retelit's and Irideos's position in the Italian telecom sector by merging the two highly complementary businesses," Asterion said in a statement.

Asterion, which specialises in mid-market European infrastructure, acquired Retelit and delisted it from the Milan stock exchange last November.

Irideos operates a network of 27,000 km fibre optic routes along motorways, the Adriatic coast and in metropolitan areas, as well as through 15 data centres.

Retelit, in turn, runs around 15,000 km of fibre, including in Italy's 14 largest cities, as well as 19 data centres, serving customers that range from large telecommunications companies to small and mid-sized businesses.

Asterion said the deal strengthens its "European digital infrastructure portfolio, which currently includes 1.4 million premises passed with Fibre-ToThe-Home, 49,000 km of long-distance fibre networks, 8,000 rural backhaul radiolinks and 42,000 square meters of data centre space in Spain, Italy, the UK, and Ireland."

JPMorgan advised Asterion on the transaction, which is expected to close in the fourth quarter after approval from relevant authorities.

($1 = 0.9842 euros)

(Reporting by Valentina Za and Elvira Pollina; Editing by Bernadette Baum and Susan Fenton)