The EU has approved the sale of a stake in an electric cable linking Ireland and the UK to a company ultimately owned by the government of Abu Dhabi.
“The European Commission has approved, under the EU Merger Regulation, the acquisition of joint control of Greenlink (Luxembourg) S.à.r.l. of Luxembourg by Mubadala Investment Company PJSC (‘Mubadala’) of the UAE, ultimately controlled by the Abu Dhabi government, and Greenlink’s pre-existing shareholders Equitix Holdings Limited (‘Equitix’) of the UK and Baltic Cable AB of Sweden,” the European Commission announced in a statement.
Greenlink is a subsea electricity cable, known as an “interconnector” linking the power markets of Ireland and Great Britain.
The cable was completed in February 2025.
In July last year, the European Commission approved the sale of the cable to a consortium made up of a Luxembourg-based investment firm and Swedish interconnector company.
Those companies remain onboard, but investors from the Middle East have now bought into the project.
“The Commission concluded that the notified transaction would not raise competition concerns, given its limited impact on competition in the markets where the companies are active,” the European Commission said.
The Mubadala Investment Company acts as a global investment firm on behalf of the sovereign wealth funds of the government of Abu Dhabi.
The company has assets of $385 billion with “aspirations to double the portfolio’s size in the coming decade”, according to its website.