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Private equity firms’ non-binding offers fail to meet parents’ expectations.
The sale of Polish mobile operator Play has been cancelled after bids from private equity firms failed to meet its parents’ expectations.
Blackstone, CVC Capital Partners, Cinven, and Warburg Pincus all made non-binding offers for the mobile operator, claimed sources cited by Reuters last week.
According to the report, the private equity firms’ offers valued Play at approximately €3.5 billion.
However, the bids reportedly fell short of Play’s owners’ expectations.
Greek investment fund Tollerton, which owns 50.3% of the company, confirmed in the report that the sale process had been cancelled.
Tollerton and Play’s other major shareholder, Icelandic private equity firm Novator Partners, began reviewing their strategic options with regard to the operator earlier this year, and at one point were considering an IPO.
In June, Liberty Global – which owns Poland’s cableco UPC – was named as a potential suitor, but no bid emerged, and Tollerton and Novator pushed ahead with an auction.
Play, which competes in Poland against Deutsche Telekom and Orange, has 14.2 million customers. According to Tollerton, In 2015, Play generated revenue of 5.4 billion zlotys (€1.3 billion) and EBITDA of PLN1.7 billion.
