LONDON - After prevailing in a bidding war for Vivendi’s mobile phone unit this weekend, Altice said Monday that it would help prepare for the acquisition by buying a 34.6 percent stake in its Numericable unit from the private equity firms Carlyle Group and Cinven.
Altice, a cable and mobile services provider based in Luxembourg, plans to merge SFR, Vivendi’s mobile business, with Numericable as part of a deal worth up to 17 billion euros, or about $23.3 billion. The share purchase is an important step in the combination of the two companies.
The deal will give Altice a 74.6 percent stake in Numericable, up from the 40 percent stake it currently holds.
On Monday, Altice said it reached an agreement to buy a 21.32 percent stake in Numericable from Carlyle Cable Investment, an affiliate of Carlyle, and a 13.27 percent stake from an affiliate of Cinven. Altice will pay a combination of €30.5 a share and shares in Altice for the private equity holdings in Numericable.
Shares of Numericable were up 13.9 percent to €30.09 in trading in Paris on Monday morning.
The transaction to expand Altice’s stake in Numericable would require an exemption from the French markets regulator. Otherwise, Altice would have to engage in a public offer for all outstanding Numericable shares under securities rules.
On Saturday, the supervisory board of the French media conglomerate Vivendi voted unanimously to sell SFR to Altice, choosing the Luxembourg firm over Bouygues, the owner of Bouygues Telecom, the third-largest mobile service provider in France, after Orange and SFR.
Bouygues had hoped to reshape the French telecommunications market by combining two of the country’s four largest mobile providers.
The battle for SFR pitted two French billionaires against each other: Martin Bouygues, who runs the diversified industrial group that bears his name, and the French entrepreneur Patrick Drahi, who since 2002 has built Altice into a global operation with cable and cellphone assets in Europe and the Caribbean.
Under the deal with Altice, which is also subject to regulatory approval, Vivendi would receive €13.5 billion when the transaction is completed and a later potential payment of €750 million. Vivendi would also receive a 20 percent stake in the combined SFR-Numericable â€" a holding that Vivendi intends to sell in installments at a later date.
Altice is expected to hold about 60 percent of the combined company after the merger, with the remainder consisting of the shares that are currently publicly traded.
The transaction’s total value is expected to be as much as €17 billion.
