By Mark Kleinman, City Editor
The parent company of Carphone Warehouse and EE, the UK's biggest mobile phone network, are this weekend hammering out deals to buy scores of Phones 4U stores in a move that would save hundreds of jobs at the troubled retailer.
Sky News has learned that EE is negotiating a deal with PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) to acquire as many as 60 shops, while Dixons Carphone has set its sights on approximately 50 of Phones 4U's remaining outlets.
PwC is understood to be keen to tie up the deals with EE and Dixons Carphone during the course of the weekend, after which they will turn their attention to attempting to sell the Phones 4U brand, stock and Life, its mobile virtual network operator, which rents spectrum from EE.
Sources close to the administrator said that Dixons Carphone had expressed an interest in taking ownership of other Phones 4U assets, while EE is expected to acquire Life.
Dixons Carphone has already salvaged 800 Phones 4U jobs by agreeing a deal to take over 160 concessions in Currys and PC World stores.
On Friday, Vodafone struck a deal to buy 140 Phones 4U shops, rescuing nearly 900 jobs, at the same time as 628 of the retailer's head office staff were being made redundant by PwC.
Even if the two store transactions are completed with Dixons Carphone and EE, thousands of jobs would still be at risk at Phones 4U, which was forced into administration last week when EE notified the company that it was terminating a distribution agreement which expires next year.
That decision left the chain without a network partner following Vodafone's withdrawal, sparking a public dispute between Phones 4U's owner – the private equity group BC Partners – and the network operators.
Sky News revealed earlier this week that Vodafone and EE had held talks in recent months about a joint takeover of Phones 4U but that the negotiations had stalled over competition issues.
The networks have denied attempting to profiteer from the retailer's collapse, despite accusations from John Caudwell, Phones 4U's founder, that they had behaved "ruthlessly".
Documents seen by Sky News show that on July 8, while discussions were taking place about extending Vodafone's distribution contract with Phones 4u, the mobile network's UK executives made a presentation to group colleagues entitled "Phones 4u - Partner of Choice".
Several weeks later, Vodafone notified Phones 4u that it would not be renewing their agreement, while no further talks about a takeover of the company were held.
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