Grupo Televisa on Friday announced that it has completed the sale of its 50% stake in Iusacell to Grupo Salinas, paving the way for AT&T to acquire the mobile operator and freeing itself up to buy cable TV firm Cablevisión Red.
The Mexican media group did not mention the final price of the Iusacell stake. However, when it agreed to offload its 50% stake in GSF Telecom Holdings, the company that owns Iusacell, to Salinas in September, the deal had US$717 million price tag.
The transaction will all ow AT&T to move forward with its agreed $2.5 billion purchase of the whole of Iusacell. The U.S. telco plans to create a North American service area covering the U.S. and Mexico, giving customers a consistent experience on a single network.
The move got the green light from regulators in December, but with certain conditions. Chief among these is the separation of Salinas’ fixed and mobile businesses; the firm will retain its fixed broadband, telephony and TV business, while AT&T will take control of the mobile operations, which comprise Iusacell and subsidiary Unefon.
Meanwhile, the transfer of Iusacell to Salinas allowed Televisa to press on with an acquisition of its own.
The firm has acquired cable TV company Cablevisión Red for 3 billion pesos (€173 million/$204 million). It will also assume MXN7.2 billion worth of debt and liabilities from the company.
Cablevisión Red has 650,000 revenue-generating units (RGUs) and, according to Televisa, could book revenues of MXN2 billion and EBITDA of MXN1 billion in 2015.
