Liberty Media is thought to be out of the running to acquire the cable assets of Deutsche Telekom for the second time, according to a report in the Financial Times. The paper quotes insiders as saying that Liberty’s consortium has failed to make it to the latest round of the auction.
Liberty had put together a second bid for the cable assets by building a consortium with three private equity firms (see
Liberty Media Puts Together Second Deutsche Telekom Bid). It is understood that all the bids received by Deutsche Telekom were below its expectations (see
Deutsche Telekom Cable Offers Are Below Expectations), which were for between E2.5 billion and E2.8 billion. The Liberty consortium’s bid is understood to be the lowest of the four bids that have been tabled, at around E2.0 billion; the highest bid is thought to be around E2.3 billion.
Last year, Liberty tabled a E5.5 billion for the six regional cable franchises, but was thwarted by the German anti-trust regulators (see German Regulators Block Liberty Cable Deal).
