Orange, Bouygues, Iliad-owned Free exploring carve-up of Patrick Drahi's SFR, FT reports

French telecom operators Orange ORA, Iliad-owned Free and construction-to-telecoms conglomerate Bouygues EN are exploring a deal to carve out Patrick Drahi's French telecom operator SFR, the Financial Times reported on Monday.

Dividing up SFR, which would probably be led by Bouygues or Iliad, would result in its assets being split between the companies, the newspaper said, citing unnamed sources.

A sale of SFR has become more likely after Drahi secured a restructuring from creditors of his French business, Altice France, earlier this year.

Blackstone, KKR and Ardian are among the investment groups to have recently held preliminary talks over financing options with SFR's potential suitors, according to the FT report.

KKR, Blackstone, Bouygues, Iliad, and Orange have declined to comment on the report.

If a deal were to be agreed, it would probably come after the completion of the Altice France restructuring, which is expected in October, FT said, citing two people familiar with the matter.

Reuters reported in February, citing sources, that Altice France is preparing to sign an agreement with its creditors to reduce the telecoms group's debt in exchange for a minority stake in the company, which will involve a debt reduction of 8.6 billion euros ($10.06 billion), bringing consolidated net debt to 15.5 billion euros.

"Altice France is focused on implementing the debt agreement, considering the sale of non-core assets and continuing SFR's commercial relaunch and improving quality of service, two indicators that have already been well underway for several months," an SFR spokesperson said in an emailed statement to Reuters on Monday.

($1 = 0.8551 euros)