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Mid Europa Creates the Leading SEE PayTV Platform through the Merger and Recapitalisation of its Investments in SBB and Telemach
12 December 2012
Mid Europa Partners ("Mid Europa") announced today the formation
of the leading pay TV platform in South Eastern Europe ("SEE"),
through the combination of SBB and Telemach, entities controlled by
funds managed or advised by Mid Europa. The combined business
will cater to more than 1.7 million users of cable TV, satellite
TV, Internet, and fixed and mobile telephony services across the
countries of the former Yugoslavia, a regional market of over 20
million inhabitants.
As part of the transaction, SBB/Telemach Group raised €330
million of senior financing from eight regional and international
banks (BNP Paribas, Erste Group Bank, ING Bank and Unicredit as
Co-ordinators & MLAs, and Banca IMI, Credit Agricole CIB,
Raiffeisen Bank International and Société Générale as MLAs) to
refinance existing debt and fund further acquisitive growth, with
the balance being available to shareholders.
Robert Knorr, Partner of Mid Europa who leads Mid Europa's SEE
investments commented: "Today's transaction marks an important step
in our regional consolidation strategy in this sector as we have
just formed the leading multi-country pay TV distribution platform
operating in SEE. Mid Europa sees similar opportunities in other
sectors in this part of the region where regional champions can be
created through consolidation and organic growth."
Andrej Babache, Associate Director of Mid Europa commented:
"This transaction is the fourth landmark financing that we have
arranged in SEE over the last few years and is the region's first
cross-border sponsor financing with multi-jurisdictional debt
pushdown. Our ability to secure attractive financing terms for this
complex transaction in testing market conditions is a testament to
the high quality and strong performance of our two businesses and
the collaborative effort of their management teams with Mid
Europa".
Dragan Solak, Chairman of the SBB/Telemach Group commented: "The
Group is one of the fastest growing pay TV providers worldwide,
having grown revenues by more than 20% annually since 2007. This
transaction not only creates a regional champion, but also gives
the Group access to significant financial resources to support
future acquisitive growth, ensuring that we can continue to take
advantage of the ample consolidation opportunities in the
region".
The financing and merger transactions were arranged and executed
by the Mid Europa team: Stefan Tzvetkov, Andrej Babache, Viktoria
Habanova and Krzysztof Jedrzejek.
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