Vodaphone has advanced its European offering by disclosing their latest bid to buy Spanish cable operator Ono.

Ono, which is private equity-owned, offers cable TV and internet services to 1.9 million Spanish households. Prior to the bid by Vodaphone, Ono’s owners had been planning to float the company on the Madrid stock exchange.

Vodaphone plans to spend £25 billion of the £84 billion they generated from the recent sale of their stake in US mobile phone operator Verizon Wireless. Vittorio Colao, Vodaphone’s boss said the deal was “an attractive value creation opportunity”.

Vodaphone has been growing steadily in developing markets such as India, but their European offering has been depressed by competition and economic condition.

This swoop will complement Vodaphone’s fiber to the home build programme, which will now incorporate areas of Spain where Ono previously had limited or no network presence. This deal has materialised just 6 months after Vodaphone acquired a controlling stake in Kabel, a German cable operator.