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The Hague - Dutch telecom operator KPN announced Tuesday it has sold its German subsidiary E-Plus to Spain's Telefonica for €5bn in cash and a 17.6% stake in Telefonica Deutschland.
The deal creates the biggest operator on the German market, as measured by subscribers, and puts an end to a long hostile effort by Mexico's America Movil to take over the KPN unit.
Following approval from the authorities, the sale should allow for €5.5bn in efficiencies on the German mobile communications market, KPN said in a statement.
"KPN will use most of this money to increase its financial flexibility and intends to resume payments of dividends to stockholders for 2014," the company said.
The announcement comes as KPN announced a 68% fall in net profit for the first half of 2013 to €108m. Sales in the period were off 8.1% from a year earlier to €2.93bn, the company said.
