Mostelecom (Mtk), the inappropriately named carrier of free-to-air television to the older apartments in Moscow has been acquired by Nafta Moskva. Nafta has now acquired Mostelecom and National Cable Networks (can't find a link to the story) in the past 6 months.
Mostelecom pipes between 8 and 14 free-to-air channels to about 3 million Moscow households, the cable network overcomes the frequency and power issues that free-to-air broadcasters cannot overcome from the Ostankino tower. It's a slightly strange network in that Mtk broadcasts to a series of mini-headends around Moscow which then pipes the signal in to the housing blocks via some very old and crappy copper coax. There is no upgradeable capacity in the network. Mostelecom's value is its rights of way access to (admittedly not the best) homes in Moscow and about $6mn in monthly revenues. Which assumes that Moscovites pay their utility bills.
The salacious gossip is that the real purchaser was not Nafta Moskva but the previous TV Minister and VI shareholder, Mikhail Lesin.
No comments:
Post a Comment