It will be led by Telefónica Group’s Mario Martin (pictured), who has “a remarkable track record in industrial management, strategic partnerships and value creation”
Last November while unveiling its five-year Transform & Grow Strategic Plan, Telefónica Group reiterated that its four key markets are Brazil, Germany, Spain and the UK, with Europe as the engine.
Now Telefónica is to set up a London-based UK Office which will report directly to Emilio Gayo, Telefónica’s Chief Operating Officer. It will be led by Mario Martín who will also be joining VMO2’s Board of Directors, “strengthening the Group’s strategic alignment and governance in one of its main European markets”.
What does this mean? Gayo said, “By opening up this UK Office, we emphasise our commitment to Europe and to a disciplined execution of our Strategic Plan. The UK is a strategic market for our Group and we aim to have a structure there that allows us to stay closer to business, support value creation and ensure management decisions are aligned with our industrial and financial priorities.”
The press statement added, “Telefónica’s new UK Office aims to support the execution of the strategic priorities laid out in Transform & Grow, promote a more integrated operational management of the Group’s UK assets, and boost coordination with the Group’s areas and business units that support our UK operations. The goal is to maximise long-term value creation in one of Telefónica’s four key markets.”
Parachuted in?
This kind of suggests Telefónica is not entirely convinced by the current execution or wants radical changes. The choice of exec to head up Telefónica’s London office is certainly interesting. Mario Martín has worked within the Telefónica Group for 30 years and is credited with “a remarkable track record in industrial management, strategic partnerships and value creation”.
For the last eight years, he was CEO at Telxius, which operates a global submarine cable network of more than 94,000 km. However, previously Telxius ran the group’s 31,000 tower sites across Europe and Latin America before they were sold off for €7.7bn in 2021. Indeed, in a then pioneering move, Telxius was set up in 2016 to spin the towers out and “create value” for the debt-crippled group.
The press release says Martin “led a solid process of business growth and worked with industrial and financial partners such as KKR and Pontegadea” – both of which were substantial shareholders in Telxius before the towers were sold off.
Preioysly, Martin held other roles including Chief Industrial Alliances Officer, Chief Asia Regional Officer — based in China and was a linchpin in Telefónica’s strategic alliance with China Unicom. He has also been M&A Director at the Group, playing a role in major deals, like the acquisition of O2 from cash-strapped BT in 2006.
Telefónica and Liberty Global, which builds and operates fibre infrastructure to provide broadband – retail and wholesale – formed Virgin Media O2 (VMO2) in 2021.
Options
Recently there was speculation that Liberty Global could be looking to buy Telefónica out of VMO2 as its preferred modus operandi in Europe is as a wholly-owned, converged (fixed and mobile) operator. This was after the Financial Times reported that Liberty Global was in talks to gain control of Three Ireland in January.
It has also reportedly made attempts to buy Vodafone out of the converged operator VodafoneZiggo in the Netherlands which was set up in 2016 and is 50:50 owned with Vodafone.
Maybe the boot is on the other foot or maybe the partners are just having a major reset? The UK has just undergone a potentially seismic shift with the merger of Vodafone and Three to form the country’s biggest mobile operator which also has big fibre ambitions. This was not long after the surprise ousting of Telefónica’s long-standing Group CEO José María Álvarez-Pallete, along with the Group COO, Ángel Vilá at the beginning of 2025.
Álvarez-Pallete was replaced by Marc Murtra, the Spanish government’s preferred candidate and a Brit. Consequently, VMO2’s ambitious fibre rollout/investment plan were paused to ensure, according to Liberty Global’s group CEO, Mike Fries, that VMO2 was aligned with Telefonica’s strategy under its new management.
Plans to spin off nexfibre, the NetCo jointly owned by Liberty Global, Telefónica Group and InfraVia Capital, were put on hold and nexfibre’s build rate slowed to a target of passing 2.5 million premises during 2025. Previously, according to various reports, Liberty and Telefónica had intended to sell between 20% and 40% of the NetCo, aiming for a total valuation of at least £5 billion (€5.9 billion),
