Altice joins forces with NextRadioTV’s Weill in new media unit

Patrick Drahi’s Altice is to create a joint venture with NextRadioTV founder Alain Weill to take over the French thematic channel provider.

Will and Altice will be partners in a joint venture in which will Weill will control 51% of the economic and voting rights and serve as executive chairman. Weill will then transfer his stake in NextRadioTV, in which he holds 37.77% – and 48.59% of the voting rights – to the new company, following which the venture will launch a voluntary tender for 100% control of the channel provider at €30 a share, a premium of 30.5% to its average price over the last six months.

The planned transactions will ultimately give Weill a 24% stake in an Altice subsidiary dedicated to investment in media companies, with a focus on diversification outside France.

Weill will joint Altice’s executive committee as managing director of Altice Media, responsible for the investment group’s media activities.

NextRadioTV offers a suite of channels including news service BFM TV, sports network RMC and Chérie TV.

“After 15 years of continued growth thanks to the success of our TV channels, radio stations and digital platforms, I am delighted to be part of this partnership between NextRadioTV and Patrick Drahi’s Altice. This partnership will allow us to continue and accelerate the development of our media activities in France and abroad,” said Weill.

“We are very excited to partner with Alain Weill, a great professional and talented entrepreneur, whom I have known and admired for almost 20 years. Alain Weill will lead our media division within Altice. The development and expansion into media and content in the countries where we are present brings an additional growth driver to Altice and offers attractive synergies with our telecom activities. This will allow us to offer the best content to our customers who already benefit from the best fibre-based fixed networks and 4G+ mobile networks. This partnership with NextRadioTV and Alain Weill represents a major step in our strategy,” said Drahi.