Pipex Sells To Tiscali

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As reported by Total Telecom, “the closing of this deal brings to an end a saga of rumours surrounding the future of Pipex.

BT was originally thought to be interested in Pipex, with rumours emerging that the U.K. incumbent was lining up a £350 million bid.”

Deal closes just four months after Tiscali confirmed its interest in possible Pipex acquisition.

Tiscali announced Friday it has completed its acquisition of U.K. broadband provider Pipex in a deal worth £210 million, on a debt-free basis. However, less than two months later Tiscali announced it had acquired Pipex, financing the deal with a €600 million debt facility from Intesa SanPaolo and JP Morgan.

Buying Pipex has brought Tiscali amongst other things 650,000 voice customers, 570,000 broadband subscribers, of which 250,000 are dual-play customers, and 100,000 SME customers.

Remember that Tiscali had to sell off several of their operations around EU to pay off a $250m loan by July last year and then promptly went out and renewed the note. Now it concerns me how they will service the €600m facility.

Massimo Cristifori (Tiscali CFO) is sailing very close to the wind and I am questioning Tiscali’s ability to sustain iteself with the kind of debt it now has onboard.

I hope the service does not deteriorate. If it does the subscribers to Pipex broadband will seek a new supplier. I am already looking at changing vendor.

Pipex Sells To Tiscali