Telstra's $11.2B sale to NBN Co. gets shareholder approval

Telstra's (ASX: TLS.AX) impending $11.2 billion sale of its wireline network to the Australian government's National Broadband Network (NBN) Co. has gotten the green light from the company's shareholders.

During Telstra's annual general meeting, 99.5 percent of the company shareholders voted to approve the deal with NBN Co., the operator of the national open access fiber broadband network.

Although gaining shareholder approval for the deal was a major hurdle to clear, the two companies still must get the approval of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), which has raised a number of red flags about the acquisition. One of its key concerns is that the plan needs to provide equal access to both Telstra and other competitive providers during the buildout of the NBN.

In August, Telstra gave its separation plan to the ACCC. In its Structural Separation Undertaking (SSU) and its Migration Plan, which provides a framework to migrate the telco's customers to the NBN, the service provider said it would complete structural separation by July 1, 2018 and the decommission of the copper network by 2020, the date when the NBN network will be completed.

Right now, Telstra is addressing the ACCC's concerns with plans to submit a revised SSU sometime in November.

For more:
- Wall Street Journal has this article (sub. req.)

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