Phone companhy appears in all the football pools like the principal candidate to remain with Digitalis +, put in sale for Hurry, but the operation is glimpsed complex. The tense relations between the operator and the company controlled by the family Polanco (after the first one comes to the OPA on Sogecable) and the high price claimed by Hurry - approximately 3.300 million euros - make the agreement difficult. Of fund, a lot of noise with the names of other possible buyers, from Vivendi, Murdoch and Slim, passing for operators like France Télecom and Vodafone.

The analysts believe that there would come to the operator very well two million subscribers of Digitalis + for several nature reasons exclusively managerial.

In the first term, for the aptitude of the television to make the clients faithful as it has revealed the experience of last years. It turns out to be more difficult that a client leaves to the competition if it has a bundle of the so called ones employed 'triple pay'-ADSL, voice and television - that when fixed telephony and wide band has only the duo, that is to say, or only voice.

The second and powerful reason of the interest of Phone companhy is to prevent this two million subscribers from finishing in hands of some company of the competition, his name be France Télecom or Vodafone, whose target is to keep on growing on the Spanish market of the telecommunications.

Nevertheless, the deterioration of the relations between Phone companhy and Hurry after the operator comes to the OPA on Sogecable makes difficult seriously the future operations between two companies. Phone companhy chose to sell his 16,7 % of Sogecable and 650 million euros to be pocketed "before the difficulties objective of defining in a clear way a future set or of agreeing on a later exit", according to sources expert in the operation. Hurry much tensed by a debt nearby to 5.000 million euros, fitted badly a decision that was aggravating moreover his financial problems and it continues without "digesting it", according to sources of the sector.

Another question enough obvious is why Phone companhy did not try to remain in Sogecable if really it has interest to extend his business of television of payment, beyond the current Imagenio subscribers. "Because the agreement was not possible", make sure the consulted sources. And it it was not, they add, "for the war of power that is lived in Hurry from the death of Jesus Polanco". The personal relation of the founder of Hurry and of the president of Phone companhy, César Alierta, was the base of many of the joint business of two companies and that has got lost in an almost irremediable way with the Polanco death.

The pulse that there support Juan Luis Cebrián, manager of Hurry, and the first executive of Sogecable, Javier Díez Polanco, not only muddied the relations with Phone companhy in the final phase of the OPA, but it can complicate the operation of sale of Digitalis +.


How much costs Digitalis +?

To the margin of the tensions between companies and internal wars, the Digitalis price + will be in the end the key for his sale. How much costs the platform of payment of Hurry? The answer is complicated, hence the pitchforks barahadas are so wide as few realistaas in many cases. The group presided by Ignacio Polanco paid 28 euros for action to be done by most of Sogecable. This supposed valuing the set of the company for approximately 3.700 million euros. It is a track, although of this number it is necessary to deduct the part corresponding to Four, which is not in sale, and it causes one more question.

How much represents the chain openly in the set of Sogecable? Also here there are different opinions, although big part of the analysts places this variable between 20 % and 25 %. Namely in big numbers, it might value Digitalis + for approximately 3.000 million euros. That supposes a few costs of approximately 1.100 euros for subscriber and enough approaches those that Hurry wants to obtain.

Here it is where the number takes a fancy especially raised, especially if it is compared with the prices paid for News Corp., the company controlled by Murdoch, the first German payment television is done by 15 % of Premier, by almost 4,2 million subscribers.

The company of the Australian magnate paid last January 287 million euros out for this bundle, that is to say that every subscriber valued for approximately 420 euros. The difference is important, although News Corp did not have to pay any bonus of control on having acquired only 15 % of the capital of the German platform of payment.

The contents constitute another excellent element at the time of determining the Digitalis price +. There is not known if Hurry and Sogecable will sell with the rights of emission acquired for the next years or if they try to support the control of the same ones and to manage them, turning into an exclusive contents provider as he has gone so far as to comment on the market.


The shade of the war of the soccer

Under a formula or other one, the future buyer, is who is, it will have to fight the contentious existing one with the rights of the soccer between Sogecable and Mediapro. If the sale materializes throughout the year, it does not seem probable that the courts have settled the dfiferencias. Although the sight of the prime mover will be celebrated next July, then the consequent resources will come, for not speaking about the difficulties in the ejecuciónd and the judgment.

the commercial Digitalis evolution + does not facilitate the camijno of his sale either. The cancellations valuation is about 12 %, what places it in maxima from 2006, and the subscribers' growth during the first trimester was perceptibly lower than the registered one in the same period of 2007. This absence of dynamism has caused a fall of the income for subscribers and of the caught publicity.

The managerial tensions, the high price, the financial difficulties, the economic crisis and the suspense on the rights of the soccer, constitute an explosive 'mix' for the sale of Digitalis +. There is added to it the urgency of Hurry to close the only operation capable of depositing in his arks the necessary money to settle the problems derived from his big debt, almost 5.000 million euros. This number represents a ratio superior to 6 times the EBITDA of the company (779,62 million euros), very high for any company reasonably well managed.

The debt, also, must be renegotiated in most cases with the deserving banks, since the credit bridge led by HSBC wins next June 20. And all this in a moment especially delicate on the national and international financial market.


(The World, 09/06/08)