MVP withdraws bid to acquire Sky Cable
MANILA, Philippines — Tycoon Manuel V. Pangilinan has pulled out his bid to purchase Sky Cable Corp. from the Lopezes over risks of catching the eye of antitrust regulators over existing business that directly overlaps with the cable provider.
“We have withdrawn bidding process of Sky Cable. Why we did that? Upon review of Bayanihan II, PCC has power to review mergers and acquisitions,” Pangilinan told reporters in an online briefing on Thursday.
That means Pangilinan is trying to avoid potentially getting asked by the Philippine Competition Commission (PCC) to divest internet and cable ventures in PLDT Inc. and Cignal TV Inc., both of which he owns, in order to take on one of their main rivals and avoid violating competition rules.
For a time, that has appeared to be possible without regulatory constraints. Under Republic Act 11494 or the Bayanihan to Recover As One Act, legislators clipped PCC’s powers by prohibiting prior review for 2 years of mergers and acquisitions worth below P50 billion—a massive amount which most M&As are unlikely to meet.
Prior to Bayanihan II, PCC reviews M&A transactions worth at least P2.6 billion in size to prevent companies from monopolizing sectors that tend to put consumers at a disadvantage.
Pangilinan said that upon further checking, it looked like PCC would still be able to examine a Sky Cable sale to Cignal even under Bayanihan 2, and he just does not want to take any chances. PCC earlier said that with Bayanihan II curtailing their review powers, regulators would instead focus on flagging monopolistic behavior of firms.
“We were not interested because we knew PCC might not approve. We were encouraged when Bayanihan II was passed. We put an offer to ABS. On further review, we were told that there is this risk of possible divestment…,” said Pangilinan, PLDT chair.
Last September, PLDT put forward an offer to buy Sky Cable from ABS-CBN Corp. after the closure of the network’s free TV and radio channels prompted the Lopezes to look for ways to stop financial bleeding.
Apart from Pangilinan, the Ayala Group, which also has Globe Telecom Inc. overlapping with Sky Cable’s internet business, was reportedly interested in acquiring the cable provider.
Businessman Dennis Anthony Uy, chief executive of Converge ICT Solutions, as well as Dennis Uy of Davao were also said to be interested on Sky Cable. So far, there has been no disclosed development on this front.
Shares in PLDT closed up 1.06% at P1,340 apiece on Thursday.
Editor's Note: A unit under PLDT's media conglomerate has a majority stake in Philstar Global Corp., which runs Philstar.com. This article was independently produced following editorial guidelines.
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