MADRID, June 12 (Reuters) - Britain's Virgin Group islooking to potentially buy Spanish budget mobile operator Yoigofrom Sweden's TeliaSonera, El Economista newspaperreported on Friday, citing sources with knowledge of thesituation.
Virgin, run by billionaire entrepreneur Richard Branson andwhich has spanned mobile phones, airlines and music stores, isstudying ways break into the Spanish telecoms market and hasheld talks with Yoigo's owners, the report said.
Virgin was not immediately available to comment, whileTeliaSonera and Yoigo declined to comment.
The Swedish telecoms group scrapped plans to sell Yoigo twoyears ago, when it struggled to attract high enough bids.Britain's Vodafone, seen at the time as a possiblebidder, has since acquired Spanish cable operator Ono.
Spain's telecoms market has recently been through a round ofconsolidation, with France's Orange also swooping onbroadband operator Jazztel.
A sale of Yoigo would likely fetch far less than themulti-billion-euro Ono or Jazztel deals, however. In 2013 it hadbeen expected to go for around 1 billion euros ($1.1 billion).
($1 = 0.8962 euros) (Reporting by Sarah White; Additional reporting by Sarah Youngin London and Helena Soderpalm in Stockholm; Editing by Paul Dayand Mark Potter)