Polkomtel Bidders Reduced to Five, Deputy CEO Kilian Says
April 06, 2011, 12:06 PM EDTBy Maciej Martewicz
(Updates with comment from Solorz’s spokesman, KPN CEO starting in sixth paragraph.)
April 6 (Bloomberg) -- Polkomtel SA’s number of bidders dropped to five from seven as the owners try to fetch more than $5 billion for Poland’s second-largest mobile phone company, its deputy chief executive officer said.
“It may be good news for the sale process,” Krzysztof Kilian told reporters in Warsaw today. The lower number may mean bidders have joined forces to offer more, he said, adding that he didn’t know which of the bidders pulled out. Kilian said March 11 that three strategic and four financial investors were bidding.
TeliaSonera AB, Sweden’s biggest phone company, said today it is still in the race. Private-equity companies Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., Apax Partners Worldwide LLP and Providence Equity Partners Inc. were among the seven bidders, one person told Bloomberg last month. Telenor ASA and Polish billionaire Zygmunt Solorz-Zak, who invests in media, telecommunications and power, were shortlisted, Gazeta Wyborcza newspaper said March 5.
Polkomtel’s owners, which include Vodafone Group Plc, oil refiner PKN Orlen SA, copper miner KGHM Polska Miedz SA and power utility PGE SA, are seeking to sell their stakes in the first half. The 2008 sale by Denmark’s TDC A/S of a 20 percent holding provides the 3.7 billion-euro ($5.3 billion) minimum valuation, KGHM said in November.
Final Offers
Management will start meetings with potential investors next week and they have until May 6 to place final offers, Kilian said.
Telenor CEO Jon Fredrik Baksaas today declined to comment on the Polkomtel auction. Solorz-Zak is still interested in the company, spokesman Tomasz Matwiejczuk said by phone today. Spokesmen for KKR, Apax Partners and Providence Equity Partners couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.
TeliaSonera, which has units in Finland, Norway, Denmark, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, wants to transfer its experience in building mobile broadband and data services if it wins Polkomtel. The company was the first to offer Apple Inc.’s iPhone in the region and currently sells smartphones to nine out of 10 handset customers in Sweden, boosting its mobile data revenue.
Polkomtel, operator of the Plus brand, has more than 14 million customers for basic voice and third-generation wireless services. It competes with Polska Telefonia Cyfrowa, owned by Deutsche Telekom AG, and France Telecom SA’s Orange.
Royal KPN NV, the largest Dutch phone company, said today it isn’t interested in Polkomtel. “The timing is not right,” incoming Chief Executive Officer Eelco Blok told reporters in The Hague.
Warsaw-based Polkomtel, which reported 1.11 billion zloty ($400 million) of net income on sales of 7.67 billion zloty last year, expects 2011 earnings to be “similar,” CEO Jaroslaw Bauc said today.
--With assistance from Diana ben-Aaron in Helsinki, Maaike Noordhuis in The Hague, Meera Bhatia in Oslo. Editors: Simon Thiel, Nathaniel Espino, Kenneth Wong.
To contact the reporter on this story: Maciej Martewicz in Warsaw at mmartewicz@bloomberg.net;
To contact the editors responsible for this story: James Gomez at jagomez@bloomberg.net Kenneth Wong at kwong11@bloomberg.net
