Exclusive: Indonesia's CT Corp proposes all-cash deal for Bakrie's media unit

By Janeman Latul and Randy Fabi

TANJUNG BENOA, Indonesia (Reuters) - CT Corp, one of Indonesia's emerging conglomerates, has proposed an all-cash deal for a controlling stake in media firm PT Visi Media Asia , valued at up to $1.8 billion, to strengthen its position in the media business in Southeast Asia's biggest economy.

The founder and chairman of CT Corp, Chairul Tanjung, told Reuters that his firm wanted to purchase Visi Media, a unit of Indonesia's powerful Bakrie family, without any partners.

"We are one of the preferred bidders. Our proposal is we want to buy it all ... my pocket is still deep," the 51-year-old billionaire said in his hotel room on the resort island of Bali, shortly after meeting with the president and cabinet ministers in his role as head of the president's economic advisory body.

"(It is) only us that can pay cash one hundred percent ... but the deal is not done yet."

CT Corp is already a major player in the Indonesian media business and controls two local TV stations. Tanjung said he would take out a new loan to buy the Visi Media stake. He declined to say how much the company would borrow for the deal.

This is the first time any bidder has publicly announced that it was offering to buy the company.

Indonesia's politically influential Bakrie family has been in talks to sell its majority interest in Visi Media to help finance a plan to buy back coal assets from London-listed Bumi Plc , sources with direct knowledge have said.

The Bakries are offering around a 51 percent stake in Visi Media, which the family controls via its vehicle CMA Indonesia. The process has been going on for the past three months with local bidders, including CT Corp and MNC Group, the sources said.

The Bakries had been looking for a valuation of $1.2 billion to $2 billion for the unit, although Visi Media's current market capitalization is only around $800 million, the sources said.

Visi Media has two national TV stations and a news website.

The sources said the stake would be worth up to $1.8 billion.

Tanjung, who trained as a dentist before becoming a businessman, also plans to build a $3 billion theme park on Indonesia's Java island and make it one of the biggest theme parks in Southeast Asia when it opens in 2016.

"We will build a city, not only a theme park, as I want to make many Indonesians feel happy," Tanjung said, adding that the land for the park would be around 200 hectares and the construction would start by the end of this year.

The group, which was founded by Tanjung, currently operates two theme parks and has plans to add another 20 theme parks across Indonesia over the next few years.

Tanjung is Indonesia's fifth-richest man with a net worth around $3.4 billion as of march, according to Forbes.

(Editing by Jonathan Thatcher and Chris Gallagher)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/exclusive-indonesias-ct-corp-proposes-cash-deal-bakries-041447140--finance.html

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