He neither commented nor disproved the information on the market about talks between LGI and Romanian cable TV company RCS&RDS.
“We are at this point in time planning to stay in that market. We don’t have any M&A transactions imminent and we don’t have any conversations that are active,” Mike Fries told UK publication Broadband TV News in an interview.
This is the first clear statement about the intentions of the U.S. group to stay in Romania since the emergence of rumors about it negotiating an exit with Romanian-held rival RCS&RDS.
Moreover, Fries said the results in Romania were good in 2011. He added that last year Romania was in fact Liberty’s best performing market relative to budget despite being one half of one percent of its business.
UPC Romania increased its number of subscriptions by 4% last year and the revenue decline slowed down to 3% to $144 million.
RCS&RDS, a company controlled by Oradea businessman Zoltan Teszari, and UPC never confirmed they had any talks. The only official statement on the matter came from Competition Council head Bogdan Chiritoiu, who said the operators had asked him whether such a deal stood chances of approval.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)