South Korea’s antitrust watchdog deferred giving a final endorsement to LG Uplus’ takeover of the country’s largest cable TV operator CJ Hello after granting a conditional approval last month.

The Fair Trade Commission (FTC) failed to reach a conclusion during its meeting on Thursday and is expected to hold another meeting at the end of this month or early next month to decide on the marriages of LG Uplus and CJ Hello and also between SK Telecom and No.2 cable TV operator T-broad.

Industry sources reckoned that the antitrust agency postponed the decision due to the gap in conditions on the two merger proposals. The FTC on September 10 granted a partial approval on the business combination of LG Uplus and CJ Hello on condition that CJ Hello should submit a plan to not to sell LG Uplus’ IPTV products for three months.

But some argued that the measure is unfair because the FTC proposed to restrict cross-selling for three years for SK Telecom and T-broad. The industry expected the agency to maintain the ban on cross-sales when it gives the final approval for the two merger plans despite SK Telecom’s protest that the ban would cause inconvenience for customers, and equally strengthen the condition for LG Uplus and CJ Hello.

Market watchers are concerned that the mergers of the nation’s biggest wireless carrier SK Telecom and third player LG Uplus would give them too much market dominance and hurt fair completion. Some are arguing that the authority should ban the companies to sell bundled products combining cable TV and telecom services.

By Shin Chan-ok, Moon Jae-yong, and Choi Mira

[ⓒ Pulse by Maeil Business Newspaper & mk.co.kr, All rights reserved]