Netia considers sale of P4 stake (Poland)Polish operator Netia is considering selling its stake in mobile operator P4 to finance its growth strategy for the period 2008-2009. The company received on 7 January an indicative expression of interest to acquire the stake. Netia’s management will make an in-depth analysis and choose between divesting the 23.4 percent stake in P4, thereby focusing even more on its broadband activities, or gathering equity financing to support both broadband and P4 development according to the current strategy. Polish mobile operator P4 had over 700,000 subscribers at the start of December, and Netia estimates that its stake in P4 is now worth well over the EUR 79.5 million it contributed to start up the mobile operation. Still, Netia expects that important additional equity contributions and extended stakeholder support will be needed to secure debt financing sufficient to fund P4 through to cash flow break-even. If Netia sells its stake, it plans to still maintain agreements to provide mobile services over P4’s network and for Netia to provide data transmission services to P4.
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