The Bulgarian incumbent telco Vivacom (BTC) has completed the sale of a 50% stake in the national transmission company NURTS to the Cyprus-based financial investor Mancelord. According to Dnevnik, the final fee paid for the stake was €57 million.
Although the deal was announced back in March, it was a further three months before it received the final approval of the Communications Regulation Commission (CRC) and Commission for Protection of Competition (CPC). Now a 50:50 joint venture between Vivacom and Mancelord, NURTS’s capital value has increased to BGN115.5 million (€58.7 million).
NURTS and indeed Mancelord are positioned to become key players in Bulgaria’s new DTT marketplace. Earlier this summer, Mancelord received CRC’s approval to acquire the Bulgarian subsidiary of Slovakia’s Towercom, which will operate one of two Bulgaria’s two national commercial DTT multiplexes.
