Grupo Prisa & Liberty Acquisition Holdings announce deal to drive Prisa Digital.

Grupo Prisa and Liberty Acquisition Holdings Corp. announced a combination of the two companies and a rights issue reserved for current Prisa shareholders by Grupo Prisa, resulting in a cash infusion of up to $900 million in Prisa.

“As a result of the transaction and of the €150 million rights issue offered to our current shareholders, Prisa believes it will emerge in a stronger position to pursue growth opportunities in its core businesses in Spanish and Portuguese-speaking markets around the world.”

“Liberty’s investment in Prisa demonstrates their strong belief in the underlying value of Grupo Prisa’s market-leading positions in educational publishing, press, audiovisual and digital, and in our strategy for growth,” said Grupo Prisa Chairman of the Board Ignacio Polanco.

“The combination with Liberty will allow Prisa to optimize the deleveraging of its balance sheet, and will facilitate the completion of previously announced asset sales,” said Grupo Prisa Chief Executive Officer Juan Luis Cebrián. “As a result of the transaction and of the €150 million rights issue offered to our current shareholders, Prisa believes it will emerge in a stronger position to pursue growth opportunities in its core businesses in Spanish and Portuguese-speaking markets around the world.”

“Prisa is a global media company with market-leading businesses and a robust portfolio of brands that are widely recognized by Spanish and Portuguese speakers all around the world,” said Liberty Chief Executive Officer Nicolas Berggruen. “We believe that this combination will help Prisa to complete its financial restructuring plan and positions it for growth over the next few years.”

“Prisa has a strong management team in place that has skillfully diversified its media and content offerings across press, television, radio and education, and is developing digital platforms that will solidify the company’s leadership position in its core markets,” added Liberty Chairman of the Board Martin E. Franklin. “We are confident in Prisa’s potential to increase its digital market penetration, to leverage its print and broadcast content and to accelerate its revenue growth in Latin America.”

Despite the pressures imposed by high leverage and the challenging economic environment, Prisa’s management has generated over €1 billion of operating cash flow over the past two years. This capital infusion is expected to allow future free cash flows to be redirected into numerous growth opportunities across the group, particularly in digital platforms and in Latin America.

“We believe that Digital+, the group’s largest asset and the leading provider of pay-TV services in Spain, will become an engine for future growth by capitalizing on the recently announced partnerships and embracing exciting new technological advancements,” added Franklin.