Reuters: Private Equity: UPDATE 1-Tele Columbus sale close - sources

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UPDATE 1-Tele Columbus sale close - sources May 14th 2012, 14:16 Mon May 14, 2012 10:16am EDT * Kabel Deutschland in pole position * Buyer could be picked as early as next month * Kabel Deutschland, Tele Columbus decline to comment (Recasts, adds sources) FRANKFURT, May 14 (Reuters) - The sale of German regional cable company Tele Columbus is nearing an end and a buyer could be picked as early as next month, two sources close to the transaction said. Kabel Deutschland is seen as frontrunner because it would be able to realise big synergies, one of the people said on Monday, adding: "There is no decision yet". Financial Times Deutschland reported Kabel Deutschland had won the race, outbidding Deutsche Telekom and Liberty Global. Private equity investors have also looked at the asset. Kabel Deutschland and Tele Columbus declined to comment. Tele Columbus's owners, comprising funds including York Capital, Golden Tree Asset Management or Avenue, which took over after the company defaulted in 2010, have mandated Rothschild to organise the sale and had agreed not to sell for less than 600 million euros ($777 million). The German cable market was once one of Europe's most fragmented, with a proliferation of smaller regional players offering television and broadband services. Tele Columbus was formerly owned by investor Scott Lanphere's Escaline group and, in 2008, almost collapsed under a roughly 1 billion euro debt load, which Lanphere dumped on Tele Columbus while building a cable empire that included German cable group EWT and a majority in rival Primacom. In the restructuring, roughly 100 creditors agreed to swap part of the debt for equity, pushing out Lanphere. Aligning the interests of the large number of owners is one of the tasks the advisers need to tackle, a person close to the transaction has told Reuters. ($1 = 0.7726 euro) (Reporting by Arno Schuetze and Peter Maushagen; Editing by Dan Lalor) Link this Share this Digg this Email Reprints

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