Warsaw (Puls Biznesu) – The acquisition of a stake in Polsat, one of Poland’s two big private TV broadcasting companies, was supposed to be announced in September. It wasn’t and there is no new deadline.
German Bertelsmann had the exclusive right to negotiate to buy a minority stake in Polsat television.
“The deadline was the end of September, I confirm this although I don’t confirm that talks were being held with this investor”, Zygmunt Solorz-Zak, Polsat’s owner and chairman said.
According to “Gazeta Wyborcza” daily, the parties agreed that at the turn of the year the German media giant, the owner of, among others, RTL7, will buy 25 percent stake in Polsat for PLN 1 billion (EUR 257m).
“We are still holding talks with investors interested in the acquisition”, Zygmunt Solorz-Zak said.
He did not say whether talks would be ended this year so that the transaction and the IPO could be conducted in 2007. The biggest media companies, including News Corp. owned by Rupert Murdoch, are interested in Polsat. However, its owner several times promised to sell part of his stakes but there has never been any transaction.
“I won’t sell Polsat”, Zygmunt Solorz-Zak declares.
And corrects himself immediately.
“I’ll keep control over the company. I’m interested only in an investor owning a minority stake and an IPO”, Polsat’s owner added.
(PLN 1 = EUR 0.257)