Mediaset says no to towers

According to local daily Il Sole 24 Ore, Fedele Confalonieri, chairman of Mediaset, has stated that the television group is not interested in bidding for the broadcasting towers of Wind and 3 Italia. He said the towers were not a strategic fit because they offered no synergies with Mediaset’s own television towers. The two cellcos were last week rumoured to have put 18,500 broadcasting aerials up for sale in a joint venture, in which they would sell a 50.1% stake. However, reports over the weekend in another newspaper, Finanza & Mercati, suggest that the sale of the towers could be halted due to a legal dispute between Wind’s main shareholder Naguib Sawiris and Alessandro Benedetti. Benedetti, an Italian businessman, claims to be entitled to a third of Wind’s parent company Weather Investments and a right of veto on strategic operations.