Tata to buy back Temasek’s stake in Pay TV platform: Report
The Tata Group is currently evaluating an offer to repurchase a stake in its entertainment content distribution platform from Temasek Holdings Pte. This move comes as the Indian conglomerate contemplates delaying the initial public offering (IPO) of Tata Play Ltd, according to the sources. They said the Tata Group is also considering whether to delay the Tata Play listing seeing the market conditions.
Instead, Tata Group has initiated talks with Temasek regarding a potential agreement that would allow the Singaporean state investor to finally exit its long-standing investment in the platform, previously known as Tata Sky. Temasek owns about 20 per cent of the content distribution platform, a source privy to the developments said.
A joint venture between Tata Group and Walt Disney Co.’s Twenty-First Century Fox Inc., Tata Play provides pay television via set-top boxes and over-the-top video streaming through its app, according to the conglomerate’s website. Tata Play was recently given a go-ahead by the regulators to proceed with the IPO.
Its listing would have been the first among the $128 billion Tata Group’s businesses to go public since Tata Consultancy Services Ltd.’s $1.2 billion IPO in 2004. Sources have also said that while Tata Group and Temasek are engaged in talks but they could still go a different way. Tata Play could still opt for a listing should market conditions improve, they added.
In 2022, Tata Play had filed confidentially with the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) and became the first company to go for filing IPO documents without making sensitive information public. Incorporated in 2001, Tata Play expanded beyond traditional pay television and PVR services with Tata Play Binge, an OTT
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