Isabel dos Santos, the daughter of the Angolan president and a leading investor in the region has purchased a further 5% in ZON Multimedia, making her the cablenet’s largest shareholder.
The purchase was made through Amsterdam-based investment vehicle Jadeium, which purchased the stake previously held by Telefonica in a reported €38 million transaction. Dos Santos’ share in ZON is now 15%.
Local sources told Broadband TV News that dos Santos is likely to eventually acquire the stakes from banks CGD and BES. This would take her share to around 30%, however such a move would likely attract the attentions of rival pay-TV groups.
Dos Santos has expressed her support for current CEO Rodrigo Costa, whose term runs until December 31.
ZON has a pay-TV joint venture in Angola and Mozambique, which has now achieved EBITDA breakeven.
Announcing consolidated revenues of €214.2 million, when compared to Q1 2011.
The number of pay-TV subscribers grew by 19,800, helped by a 26,200 increase in cable subscribers, though DTH satellite fell back by 6,500.
Voice and broadband subscriber numbers grew by 37,000 and 9,400 respectively.
ZON closed the quarter with a total of 1,586 basic subscribers.
The high-end IRIS bundles are now received by 120,000, the number was boosted at the end of February with a promotional campaign, itself launched to counter activity by a competitor.
ZON reported increased use of the Restart TV feature, which has increased four-fold over the last six months, as customers become increasingly familiar with the NDS Snowflake interface.
