MILAN (Standard&Poor's) Aug. 10, 2005--Standard&Poor's Ratings Services said today that its ratings and outlook on Germany's largest telecommunications operator Deutsche Telekom AG (DT; A-/Stable/A-2) and related entities are unaffected by the announcement that the group's Austrian mobile subsidiary, T-Mobile Austria, is to acquire tele.ring Telekom Service GmbH, the fourth-largest mobile operator on the Austrian market. The consideration will be €1.3 billion, which will be funded from DT's existing financial resources. The combined subscriber market share of tele.ring and T-Mobile Austria is about 38% pro forma for the transaction, which significantly boosts T-Mobile's presence from the current 25% in a very competitive market. We consider that DT has sufficient financial flexibility for this business-profile-protecting transaction. At March
