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Liberty blasts advisor comms knowledge over Swiss deal

US-based Liberty Global is moving to save a sale of its Swiss unit, offering funding to support a rights offering by buyer Sunrise Communications.
That comes as the deal to sell UPC Switzerland for 6.3bn Swiss francs takes fire from top Sunrise shareholder Freenet as well as proxy advisor ISS, which has recommended a vote against the deal when shareholders gather Oct. 23. Liberty Global is supporting the rights offering up to 500m Swiss francs via buying tradeable subscription rights at market prices, as well as commiting to buy newly issued shares (if any) in the offering.

Liberty and Sunrise have also agreed that Liberty would receive a board seat nomination so long as its shareholding exceeds 5%. If fully utilized, Liberty's plan would have its ownership hit 7.8% at current market prices.
“ISS demonstrated a surprisingly poor understanding of the telecom industry in this report,” says Liberty Global CEO Mike Fries. “Fixed-mobile convergence is the future. Industry leaders, regulators and sector analysts all agree on that point. European operators have already completed over €100bn in transactions just like this one, and at even higher multiples."