PT Multimedia rebrands as Zon
Company leads pay TV in Portugal
The company will now be called Zon Multimedia, and the name also will be applied to its subsidiaries, such as Zon TV Cabo, Zon Lusomundo and Zon Phone.
The name was developed by branding company MyBrand, which in June developed the IPTV brand Meo for Portugal Telecom.
Zon vs. Meo will stand at the center of the battle for control of Portugal's tripleplay market cable, Internet and telephone flanked by the other key player, Sonae.com, which controls 20% of the mobile phone market, 17% of the landline phone market and has its own IPTV service.
Analysts forecast a merger between Zon Multimedia and Sonae.com in the near future and view the name change and the recently unveiled business plan as an attempt by Zon Multimedia to leverage bargaining power in merger negotiations.
Zons shares rose 2.4% on the eve of the name change.
The companys business plan promises growth rates of 10%-12% a year well in excess of its competitors and aims to attain Euros 1 billion ($1.46 billion) annual revenue by 2010.
Late last year Zon purchased three niche operators Bragatel, Pluricanal Leiria and Pluricanal Santarem for $87.6 million. Earlier this month, it agreed to pay $146 million for the purchase of TVTel, which has a 3% market share.
Zon has a quasi-monopoly of subscription TV in Portugal, with more than 80% of the market, but this scenario may soon change with the introduction of digital terrestrial television, with a public tender scheduled for the DTT platform in February of this year.
Zons forecast turnover for 2007 is $1.032 billion with EBITDA of $331 million. It has 1.5 million TV clients.
