Tele Columbus has launched a share offering to repay debt used to fund its recent acquisitions of Primacom and Pepcom, which will cement its position as Germany’s third-largest cable operator.
Tele Columbus (ETR:TC1) has launched a share offering to repay debt used to fund its recent acquisitions of Primacom and Pepcom, which will cement its position as Germany’s third-largest cable operator.
Working with joint global co-ordinators and bookrunners Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan, Tele Columbus has set the subscription price at €5.40 per share for the almost 71 million new shares, which should mean proceeds of around €383m (US$434m).
When first announced in August, the capital increase was only planned to raise €240m (US$271m).
Proceeds from the share issuance will be used to repay a bridge loan and second lien facility that helped fund July’s €711m (US$774m) acquisition of Primacom, and to part fund the €608m (US$688m) purchase of Pepcom.
The two acquisitions mean Tele Columbus has expanded its footprint from 1.7 million homes, which it claimed when it listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange earlier this year, to 3.7 million. Ronny Verhelst, the company’s CEO (pictured), has hinted at further acquisitions down the line.
Shareholders will be able to acquire five new shares for every four they already own. The price represents a 33% discount to the company’s expected new share price once the offering has completed, as extrapolated from Tele Columbus’s closing share price on 16 October.
The subscription period is set to begin on 21 October and will run until 3 November. The shares are expected to start trading on 6 November and will have full dividend rights from the start of 2016.