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IPhone 11 prices in UK; Facebook's Libra on Swiss license; TeamViewer's IPO

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IPhone 11 prices in UK; Facebook's Libra on Swiss license; TeamViewer's IPO

The Daily Dose LIVE returns to the City of London on Tuesday, Oct.1! Join us for a timely panel discussion over breakfast on the vulnerabilities facing the banking sector and other parts of corporate Europe in a period of deep political, policy and economic uncertainty. Register today to secure your place at this popular breakfast event.

TOP NEWS

* Apple Inc.'s new smartphone models, iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max, will be released in the U.K. next week at £1,049 and £1,149, respectively, London's The Guardian reports.

* Facebook Inc.'s digital currency project Libra is looking to be licensed as a payment system in Switzerland. The Libra Association, a Geneva-based consortium of Facebook and 28 other entities, has asked the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority to assess how it would classify Libra under Swiss law.

* German software company TeamViewer GmbH set the price range for its IPO at between €23.50 and €27.50 per share. The company said its IPO offer consists of up to 84.0 million existing shares from the holdings of TeamViewer's current owner, TigerLuxOne Sàrl, a holding company majority-owned by funds advised by private equity firm Permira Advisers Ltd.

* A minority stake in the esports unit of Sweden-based event organizer Modern Times Group and a joint venture could open another source of revenue for Chinese livestreaming platform HUYA Inc., analysts said.

PAN-EUROPEAN

* Discovery Inc.'s Eurosport will broadcast the World Urban Games Budapest 2019 live under an agreement with the Global Association of International Sports Federations. The matches will be aired on Eurosport and Eurosport Player in more than 50 countries and territories across Europe in 21 languages.

* Vodafone Group PLC tapped video technology provider Kaltura Inc. to use the latter's cloud TV technology in its recently launched Vodafone TV service in Greece, Portugal and Romania.

UK AND IRELAND

* Sky Ltd. is doubling its investment on original content over the next five years in line with NBCUniversal International Television Distribution's combination with the British pay TV company's sales arm Sky Vision, Deadline reports. The transition will take place Oct. 1 and will see the NBCUniversal LLC unit taking over the sales of Sky titles. Comcast Corp. owns both Sky and NBCUniversal.

* The U.K. will "soon" make a decision on whether to allow Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. in the country's 5G networks build out, but will expect a "code of behavior" from China if the equipment maker will be allowed to participate, Reuters reports, quoting U.K. Defense Secretary Ben Wallace.

* Akazoo Ltd. completed its merger with Modern Media Acquisition Corp., with the two entities combining into a new holding company. The combined entity, which will be called Akazoo SA, commenced trading Sept. 11 on the Nasdaq Stock Market under the ticker symbol SONG.

* U.K.-based OneWeb Ltd. may require additional funding of about $5 billion to build the infrastructure for its broadband-by-satellite service. The company has started to look for funding sources, Advanced Television reports, citing CFO Tom Whayne.

* Digital advertising company S4 Capital PLC said it is in line with its goal to double the size of the company by 2021. The London company reported first-half billings of about £184.2 million, up 44.4% year over year from about £127.6 million, on a pro forma basis.

* U.K.-headquartered V-Nova has teamed up with over-the-top solutions provider Simplestream Ltd. to assist with the launch of its MVMO streaming service in Africa in late 2019.

GERMANY, SWITZERLAND AND AUSTRIA

* Waipu.tv launched a restart function that would be available on all regular TV channels, except for selected programs operated by ProSiebenSat.1 Media SE due to legal concerns, Broadband TV News reports. The German internet TV service also unveiled plans to launch eight new channels in autumn.

* T-Labs, the innovation laboratory by Deutsche Telekom AG, is launching Xride, a blockchain-based e-mobility pilot for e-scooters. The technology could also be used within the healthcare industry and logistics.

FRANCE

* Business fiber optic operator Celeste SAS signed an agreement to acquire 100% of the capital of PacWan for an undisclosed amount. Celeste President Nicolas Aubé said the merger will allow to further develop their business in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region.

* Orange SA renewed the contract allowing Vivendi SA's Canal Plus Group SA subscribers access to OCS four channels focused on films and series. Financial terms were not disclosed.

* Orange also announced it priced its issuance of €500 million of undated 7.5 year non-call deeply subordinated fixed to reset rate notes, with a fixed coupon of 1.75% until the first call date. The company said the notes are set to enter Euronext Paris.

* Bolloré SA entered into an agreement with Amundi Private Equity Funds, Bpifrance SA and Socadif SA SCR to sell its 55% stake in Wifirst SAS. Bolloré said the deal is expected to generate about €115 million, with a capital gain of around €85 million.

NETHERLANDS, BELGIUM and LUXEMBOURG

* Naspers Ltd. listed Prosus NV, a new entity which will carry its international internet assets, on the Euronext Amsterdam under the ticker PRX. Prosus' assets are valued at more than $100 billion, including its investments in China's Tencent Holdings Ltd. and Ctrip.com International Ltd., as well as Russia's Mail.ru Group Ltd.

* Dutch software company Solimas Groep BV has acquired a significant shareholding in Barneveld-based Vanessen ICT. The acquisition brings Solimas' combined turnover to approximately €15 million.

NORDIC COUNTRIES

* Telia Co. AB. named Christian Luiga acting president and CEO, effective Sept. 12. Luiga, who is currently executive vice president and CFO, will temporarily replace Johan Dennelind who announced his resignation in early August.

* Luca Baratta will resign as chief accounting officer of Spotify Technology SA effective Sept. 16. Paul Sawyer, who is currently the controller of Spotify, will replace Baratta as the company's new accounting chief.

* Taiwanese company ALi Corp.will integrate Norway-based streaming and hybrid TV solutions provider Vewd Software AS' cloud-based Atom solution to its set-top box platform. The integration will bring full OTT functionality to entry-level set-top boxes, enabling them to run modern TV apps.

* Danish TV and internet provider Waoo A/S said that its TV customers are now able to view streamed content from Nordic Entertainment Group AB's Viaplay AB directly from the set-top box, without using an app on a computer or mobile. Waoo renewed its deal with Viaplay earlier this year.

* Nordic Entertainment said that it has commissioned a season two of thriller series "The Lawyer." The series is currently filming, and will premiere on Viaplay across the Nordic region in 2020.

SOUTHERN EUROPE

* Telefónica SA is teaming up with Spanish ICT development agency Red.es to conduct 5G trials in Spain's Galicia region, Telecompaper reports. The project will get a total investment of €11 million for eight 5G use cases.

* Telecom Italia Sparkle SpA secured a contract from the Institute of Informatics and Telematics of the Italian National Research Council to provide colocation and interconnection services for the ".it Registry" in Sao Paulo, Brazil, according to a news release. Sparkle is the international service provider unit of Telecom Italia SpA.

* Video-on-demand services provider Magine Pro agreed to ease the integration of Spanish film streaming service FlixOle for its distribution partners, Telecompaper reports. Among others, Magine Pro will provide a global distribution tool as well as enable the expansion of FlixOle into more devices.

* Turkey's highest court began hearing an appeal to reverse a government ban on online encyclopedia Wikipedia, The Associated Press reports. The Turkish government blocked access to Wikipedia in April 2017 after the website refused to remove content that supposedly portrayed Turkey as a country that supports the Islamic State group and terrorist organizations.

* Global connectivity and communications service provider Epsilon Telecommunications Ltd. will deploy its software-defined networking platform, Infiny by Epsilon, in Turkey, through a tie-up with ORIS Telekom. The companies activated a joint point of presence at the TI Sparkle data center in Istanbul to support the platform.

* Red Arrow Studios International GmbH named Maria Arroyo senior sales manager for Italy, Spain, Portugal, Turkey and Israel, effective immediately. Arroyo joins Red Arrow from Spanish distributor Onza Entertainment Sl., where she was international sales manager of scripted, non-scripted and factual content for Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Canada.

EASTERN EUROPE

* Orange Polska SA teamed up with Ericsson to conducts tests on its 5G network in Warsaw, Telecompaper reports. Orange's network can handle download speeds of nearly 900 Mbps.

* CenturyLink Inc. made its content delivery network services available in Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Romania, in response to increasing demand for over-the-top content. The U.S. company launched a point of presence in Zagreb, Croatia, to support the technology.

* Russian VOD service ivi.ru Media Ltd. secured exclusive rights to 50 hours of programming under a deal with All3Media Ltd. unit All3media International Ltd., TBI Vision reports. The deal, which covers Russia, the former Soviet Union states and Baltic countries, includes psychological thriller "The Feed" and scripted series "Dark Money."

* Russia's Mobile TeleSystems PJSC is planning to invest 900 million Russian rubles over three years in digital infrastructure across the country's Lipetsk region, Telecompaper reports. The telco's partnership with the Lipetsk government will see the launch of digitization projects such as the testing of smart city services.

* A draft law before the Russian parliament is proposing raised fines of up to 18 million Russian rubles for individuals, officials and entities storing Russian citizens' personal data abroad, Telecompaper reports, citing Tdaily.ru. The parliament's lower house has already approved the draft legislation on its first reading.

FEATURED NEWS

La Liga in UK, Ireland; Facebook Watch's European strategy; Pluto TV on Apple TV: Premier Sports acquired rights to stream La Liga matches in the U.K. and Ireland, Facebook teamed up with European publishers for Watch content, and Pluto TV is available on Apple TV in the U.K., Germany and Austria.

5G Focus: Huawei, Samsung 5G chips; rollout in Germany; tie-ups in South Korea: 5G Focus is a weekly global roundup of notable 5G trials, launches, use cases and major equipment supply contracts. It also features in-depth analysis of strategies, expansion plans, business models and other related initiatives.

FEATURED RESEARCH

Economics of TV & Film: Boxing on FOX PPV headlines packed September lineup: A look at events and movies on pay-per-view and video on demand in September.

Anne Freier, Sylvia Edwards Davis, Charlotte van Hek and Esben Svendsen contributed to this report.

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