Goldman Sachs acquires Hathway Cable stake
January 19, 2015
By Chris Forrester
Goldman Sachs is busy buying up stakes in India’s cable industry. It has already bought into DEN Networks having paid $110 million. Now it has acquired 4.8 per cent of Hathway Cable & Datacom, paying $8.5 million (Rupees 526 million) for the holding, which represents 8.1 million shares. Goldman Sachs already holds a 17.8 stake in DEN.
The bank’s move follows on from other interesting investments. For example, Australian investment bank Macquarie has also bought 1.3 million shares in Hathway, and in the process building up its stake from 9.11 per cent to 9.42 per cent.
Other notable investors in Hathway include Providence Equity Partners (10.85 per cent), Reliance Capital (5.23 per cent) and Hong Kong-based investment fund CLSA Global (4.02 per cent).
Such investments in the increasingly digitised Indian cable networks clearly makes sound business sense. Whether the investments will lead to the long-expected consolidation within the sector only time will tell.