Media | 02.09.2008
No Split for ProSiebenSat.1 Group, Owner Says
European broadcaster ProSiebenSat.1, which owns a string of TV channels in Germany, Scandinavia and eastern Europe, is not putting them up for sale, a main owner said in a news interview published Tuesday.
Joerg Rockenhaeuser, who heads the German operations of private-equity investor Permira, dismissed suggestions that the TV company would raise cash by selling channels.
"From the shareholder point of view, that wouldn't make any sense," he told the Sueddeutsche Zeitung newspaper.
Permira and another private-equity investor, KKR, control 88 percent of Munich-based ProSiebenSat.1, which in turn owns the Swedish-based group SBS. Earnings at ProSiebenSat.1 have lagged amid high debt after the SBS takeover.
Rockenhaeuser said the investors hoped to discover fresh synergies in the sprawling group, such as airing one channel's best programs on the other channels, adding that the business was "well on its way to repeating in 2009 the success of past years."
Speculation on a disposal began in the German media in April after Michael Boernicke, the chief of a German pay-TV company, Premiere, said he would like to buy Sat.1, one of the big group's German channels. The group has repeatedly said it has no desire to sell.
