French cablenet Numericable is planning an IPO that potentially values the company at €5 billion.
Cinven, Carlyle and Altice Group, the latter owned by entrepreneur Patrick Drahi, are looking to take advantage of the current enthusiasm for the cable sector following last year’s listing of Dutch operator Ziggo and the recent €7.7 billion purchase of Kabel Deutschland by mobile operator Vodafone.
An analysts’ conference is slated for Thursday, with an investor roadshow getting underway before the end of the month.
French media says Deutsche Bank and JP Morgan are leasing the operation. which is aiming for a valuation of 8-9 times EBITDA, ahead of the average valuation of European cable stocks.
Numericable has recently moved to extend its 1.6 million customer footprint with the launch of a new IPTV service.
The introduction of the cabler’s multiplay fibre product Labox has also proved to be a success.
