LONDON, Aug. 7, 2007 (PRIME NEWSWIRE) -- Virgin Media Inc. (Nasdaq:VMED) announced on July 2nd that it had received a proposal to acquire 100% of the common stock of the Company and that it would consider the proposal as a part of its review of strategic alternatives, including a process for a possible sale of the Company. As a consequence of this review and the resulting process, potential strategic and financial counterparties have continued to confirm a strong ongoing interest in a transaction. To enhance shareholder value, Virgin Media's financial advisors have recommended that Virgin Media extend the process until these parties can complete their proposals in a more stable debt market environment.
There is no assurance that any transaction will occur or, if so, at what price.
About Virgin Media
Virgin Media is an innovative and pioneering UK entertainment and communications business. For the first time consumers can get everything they need from one company -- the UK's only quad play of TV, broadband, phone and mobile plus the most advanced TV on demand service available, the UK's first high definition TV service and V+, our high specification personal video recorder. We're the UK's most popular residential broadband provider, the largest virtual mobile network operator and the second largest provider of pay TV and home phone.
Virgin Media owns two content businesses -- Virgin Media Television (VMTV) and sit-up. VMTV owns seven entertainment channels -- Living, Living 2, Bravo, Bravo 2, Challenge, Trouble and Ftn -- and is a 50% partner in UKTV which consists of ten channels including UKTV Gold and UKTV History. Sit-up runs retail TV channels bid tv, price-drop tv and speed auction tv.
"Safe Harbor" Statement under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995
The Company does not undertake to comment further on the process described above unless and until a definitive agreement is reached or the process is abandoned. Various statements contained in this press release constitute "forward-looking statements" as that term is defined under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Works like "believe", "anticipate", "should", "intend", "plan", "will", "expects", "estimates", "projects", "positioned", "strategy", and similar expressions identify these forward-looking statements, which involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause our actual results, performance or achievements or budgeted, whether expressed or implied, by these forward-looking statements. These factors, among others, include: (1) the ability to compete with a range of other communications and content provides; (2) the ability to control customer churn; (3) the effect of technological changes on our businesses; (4) the continued right to use the Virgin name and logo; (5) the ability to maintain and upgrade our networks in a cost-effective and timely manner; (6) possible losses in revenue due to systems failures; (7) the ability to provide attractive programming at a reasonable cost; (8) the reliance on single-source suppliers for some equipment, software and services and third party distributors of our mobile services; (9) the functionality or market acceptance of new products that we may introduce; (10) the ability to obtain and retain expected synergies from the merger of our legacy NTL and Telewest businesses and the acquisition of Virgin Mobile; (11) rates of success in executing, managing and integrating key acquisitions, including the merger with Telewest and the acquisition of Virgin Mobile; (12) the ability to achieve business plans for the combined company; (13) the ability to fund debt service obligations through operating cash flow; (14) the ability to obtain additional financing in the future and react to competitive technological changes; (15) the ability to comply with restrictive covenants in our indebtedness agreements; and (16) the extent to which our future earnings will be sufficient to cover our fixed charges.
These and other factors are discussed in more detail under "Risk Factors" and elsewhere in Virgin Media's Form 10-K filed with the SEC on March 1, 2007. We assume no obligation to update our forward-looking statements to reflect the actual results, changes in assumptions or changes in factors affecting these statements.