Babcock & Brown Ltd., Australia's second-biggest investment bank, has issued a bid for Irish telco Eircom Group Plc, for €2.36 billion to take advantage of opportunities in the eurozone's fastest  growing economy.

Babcock & Brown has offered €2.20 in cash for each Eircom share , the company said in a statement today - just 2.8 percent above Thursday's closing price. A 5.2 cent-a-share dividend may also be paid out, Eircom said. Babcock's offer is a co-bid with Eircom's own employee share ownership trust.

The bid for Eircom has been made four months after a failed takeover attempt for it by Swisscom AG, Switzerland's largest telco. Eircom controls 79 percent of Ireland's fixed-line phone market and offers opportunities to access the country's mobile- phone market, where consumers spend develop the mobile sector where the Irish spend about 50 percent more on calls than in the U.K., Germany and Italy.

Eircom shares have risen 38 percent since the company returned to the stock market in March 2004 after a three-year absence. Ireland's ISEQ Overall Index has risen 53 percent in that period.