Italy’s competition authority has told local towerco EI Towers that its €1.2bn (US$1.4bn) bid for state-owned rival Rai Way can not be authorised in its current form.
EI Towers said on 31 March that it was still confident of getting its offer…
Italy’s competition authority has told local towerco EI Towers that its €1.2bn (US$1.4bn) bid for state-owned rival Rai Way can not be authorised in its current form.
EI Towers said on 31 March that it was still confident of getting its offer approved, once it has examined the authority’s findings and presented its observations.
The group’s original cash-and-stock offer was tied to obtaining a minimum 66.67% stake.
However, Italy’s government has sought to block the deal, insisting it must retain at least 51% of Rai Way because of the “strategic importance of network infrastructure”.
The board of state broadcaster Rai, which is Rai Way’s parent company, said in a separate statement on 31 March that the government’s stance meant the deal “must be regarded as inadmissible”.
However, responding to what it described as an “unusual press release”, EI Towers questioned the comments by pointing to how it had already reserved the right to waive its condition of a 66.67% stake
The group, which is 40%-controlled by former Italian president Silvio Berlusconi’s Elettronica Industriale (EI), got the nod from shareholders earlier in March for a €374m (US$405m) capital hike to back the deal. It plans to issue up to 8.16 million ordinary shares by the end of 2015.
It has also secured a loan for up to a €1.1bn (US$1.18bn) to finance the cash portion of the deal with a consortium including JP Morgan, Unicredit and BNP Paribas.
The antitrust watchdog’s probe was launched to assess the deal’s potential implications for the Italian radio and broadcasting infrastructure sector, in view of the “vertically integrated” nature of EI Towers’ ownership. Its ultimate parent group, Mediaset, has wider broadcast interests and is also controlled by Berlusconi.
Plans for the offer were filed separately with local market regulator Consob in mid March, which has 15 days to review it but paused the process on 27 March to seek additional information.
As well as terrestrial and fibre networks, Rai Way provides a free satellite platform called tivùsat that uses Eutelsat Hot Bird 9 at 13E.