Rupert Murdoch, an Australian-American media mogul who is chairman and chief executive of News Corporation, is keen to acquire some of the remaining 20 per cent of shares in Cable Thai Holdings, according to Wichai Thongtaeng, chairman of CTH.
Wichai revealed this to CTH's more than 300 members yesterday in the annual general meeting of the Thailand Cable TV Association (TCTA).
He said Murdoch had expressed his interest in acquiring a stake in CTH after the company secured the rights to broadcast English Premier League soccer matches for the 2014-2016 seasons.
Of CTH's shares, 30 per cent are owned by local cable TV operators, 25 per cent are Wichai's and 25 per cent are held by Vachara Vacharaphol, CEO of Trend VG3, a subsidiary of the company that publishes the Thai Rath daily newspaper. CTH welcomes new investors to hold the remaining stakes.
Wichai said that apart from Murdoch and his company Fox Broadcasting, CTH was in talks with other five media companies in Malaysia, Hong Kong, Singapore and South Korea.
Additionally, this year the company plans to spend about Bt1 billion on acquiring content and Bt7 billion on expanding the fibre-to-home network and procuring set-top boxes.
It will launch its new image and service in the next couple months. After that, CTH's members will charge subscribers Bt399 a month on average for a basic package. To view the EPL matches, they will have to buy the EPL package on the top of the basic package for Bt100-Bt400 a month, depending on the number of matches. The EPL packages are expected to be available in June.
CTH is reportedly in talks with free-TV operators for them to broadcast 17 selected matches out of the total of 380 per year, in line with CTH's contract with the EPL. The negotiations are expected to be finalised this month.
CTH has already distributed 300,000 set-top boxes to subscribers to receive the 120 channels it plans to provide. It expect to finish distributing the units to all existing subscribers and an estimated 2 million new subscribers this year. The subscribers will be required to sign up for a one-year contract.
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Article source: http://www.thethailandlinks.com/2013/04/27/murdoch-eyes-stake-in-cth-chairman/
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