Wherever they speak Spanish, Telefonica de Espana SA reckons there’s a phone company about to be privatised in which it could participate – and even where they don’t speak Spanish, the company sees opportunities: already with 43.7% of Chilean local company Compania de Telefonos de Chile SA and 20% of the long-distance and international carrier Empresa Nacional de Telecommunicaciones de Chile SA, it wants to raise its stake in the latter to 40% when and if the rules change to allow it to do so; the long-running saga of the on-off privatisation of the Argentine phone company is on again, with the plan now to split it into separate companies serving the north and south of the country – and Telefonica has its eyes on at least a stake in each; it hopes to become involved when Mexico and Puerto Rico decide details of how they will privatise their phone companies, and wants in on any international consortium formed to buy into New Zealand’s telephone company.
