Dish TV tapping investors for Rs 1,000-cr fund

09 Dec 2011 Evaluate

Dish TV, the country’s largest direct-to-home television company, is reaching out to private equity and institutional investors for a fresh round of fund raising, which could turn out to be the highest in the sector. Dish is believed to have appointed investment banks UBS and Macquarie to help raise around Rs 1,000 crore ($200 million) of equity to fund expansion and investment in upgrading technology. The final structure is unclear, as is the extent that existing shareholders would dilute stake, as preliminary talks have just begun. The promoters, the Zee Group’s Subash Chandra Goel and his family, hold close to 65 per cent stake in the company. Dish TV has got the necessary approval from the Foreign Investment Promotion Board but we it has not decided on the amount, time frame and how the money will be raised. The DTH sector has a foreign holding cap at 49 per cent. In Dish, the foreign investment is 27 per cent. DTH is a system of receiving TV programmes from satellite within homes through personal dish antennas, bypassing cable operators. India is set to become the largest DTH market in the world in terms of subscribers next year, overtaking America, according to a study by Media Partners Asia.

Two years earlier, Dish TV issued fresh shares for a round of fund raising from PE investors. New York-based asset management firm Apollo Management picked up an 11 per cent stake for $100 mn (Rs 465 crore) after the company raised money through global depository receipts.  Dish’s attempts to win subscribers in a crowded market have stretched its balance sheet and left the company highly leveraged. DTH companies bear part of the cost of equipment sold to a new consumer. This is to attract customers, with the expectation that they’d pay back and generate more money over time through monthly subscription fees. Dish has a gross subscriber base of 12 mn, with around 30 per cent market share in a six-player market. But quarterly losses are rising. During the July-September quarter, Dish recorded a 48 per cent jump in revenue to Rs 482 crore, compared to Rs 326 crore in the corresponding quarter last year. However, there was a net loss of Rs 48.6 crore, against Rs 45.2 crore in the same period last year. The company also added 577,000 subscribers in the quarter.

Dish TV India Share Price

15.15 -0.33 (-2.13%)
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Peers
Company Name CMP
Zee Entertainment 149.55
Sun TV Network 656.50
GTPL Hathway 164.05
TV18 Broadcast 42.06
Den Networks 49.28
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