Avrei voluto postare un po' di indicazioni sull'andamento di Cell C ... so che ha diffuso i risultati ma non ve ne è traccia in rete, se non per queste considerazioni sul livello elevato del debito nell'ambito del contenuto di una conversazione fra il CEO di Cell C ed un giornalista che ne riferisce in un suo articolo.
Chi rammenta un po' la situazione di Cell C quando era più facile leggerne in giro, ricorderà che i problemi della terza telecom sudafricana sono due: 1) un alto leverage dovuto ad un forte indebitamento nei primi anni di vita di Cell C, in cui scelte imprenditoriali sbagliate hanno a lungo ritardato il raggiungimento di un pareggio operativo e costretto la proprietà a sostenere l'attività di Cell C mediante continui finanziamenti e 2) il fatto che il debito obbligazionario, anch'esso importante, è tutto denominato in valute forti come Euro e USD, mentre i ricavi sono realizzati in ZAR, con la conseguenza che la svalutazione dello ZAR contro queste valute ha pesato drasticamente sul costo di servizio del debito.
Il risultato è che, sebbene la società abbia raggiunto un utile operativo dopo il cambio del management, i suoi conti restano in profondo rosso per il peso degli interessi sul debito.
27 February 2009
Cell C's sea of debt
By DUNCAN McLEOD
Jeffrey Hedberg has done a great job of turning mobile operator Cell C around. But the company is drowning in a sea of debt not of his making. Hedberg thinks Telkom should buy the company. Telkom shareholders might be horrified at the prospect.
Hedberg, a former senior Deutsche Telekom executive with many years' experience in telecommunications, has done a great job of taking the fight to Cell C's bigger rivals, MTN and Vodacom. He has grown the company's market share through aggressive but clever tariff plans and he has made the operator a much more formidable competitor in SA's telecom industry.
But there are big problems, which he readily admits are beyond his control. By far the biggest of these is the company's debt nightmare - it's not known how deep in the hole Cell C really is because it doesn't report details about its real profitability - but it owes its financiers many billions of rand. Interest payments, denominated in dollars and euros, run into hundreds of millions of rand every year.
As a result, the company has never reported a net profit. Operationally it is in the black, but its debt mountain means it's unlikely to turn a real profit for many years to come.
Hedberg conceded to me over lunch last week that something has to be done - and urgently - about the situation. Unfortunately,
restructuring Cell C's debt has become a lot more difficult given the worsening global financial situation.
An equity infusion from the shareholders - Saudi Telecom-controlled Oger Telecom (which holds a controlling 75% stake) and empowerment group CellSaf (25%) - seems to be the only feasible option right now.
But even that may prove difficult.
Negotiations are under way between Oger Telecom and CellSaf - which itself consists of 32 shareholders - about how to resolve the debt problem. However, one has to wonder how keen Oger is on recapitalising its only African asset. And CellSaf is anything but cash-flush.
There is another option - selling Cell C to Telkom. It's an option that appeals strongly to Hedberg. The fixed-line operator, hurting from rampant copper theft in its fixed-line division and from robust competition in broadband from Vodacom and MTN, is keen to enter the mobile space, and is already building a 3G network in SA's urban centres. It plans to launch full mobile services after it has disposed of its 50% stake in Vodacom.
It's difficult to know if it makes financial sense for Telkom to buy Cell C given the lack of information about the extent of the mobile operator's debt. Needless to say, if Cell C weren't drowning in debt, it would be a no-brainer for Telkom to use part of the proceeds of its sale of Vodacom - estimated at about R10bn - to buy the company.
"It would make strategic sense for both parties," Hedberg says. "It would give us in-country scale, access to a company with a strong balance sheet, a company that is strong in the corporate segment, and it would give us access to a company with leased lines that we'd need to carry [network traffic to] our base stations.
"On the other hand, it gives Telkom an opportunity to play in the wireless space," he says. "Telkom doesn't have a lot of experience there. A go-it-alone strategy is tough."
Cell C could also help Telkom expand in mobile elsewhere in Africa.
Hedberg says the timing is "perfect" for a deal. "I'm sure the competition commission would approve the transaction. But in these markets will [the shareholders] ever agree on a price?"
Were the deal to happen, it would realign SA telecoms - in a positive way. It would create three powerful operators in Telkom, Vodacom and MTN, with smaller players Neotel and dark horse Dimension Data's Internet Solutions, to keep them in check. Let's hope it happens.
