European satellite company offering to buy Spacecom

Shortly before the close of trade yesterday, Space-Communication Ltd., the firm that operates the Amos 1 and 2 Israeli satellites, announced it has received an offer from SES, the largest satellite operator in Europe.

SES has offered to buy out the Israeli firm's operations and assets, either through acquisition or a merger with a SES subsidiary.

The offer by the Luxembourg-based firm comes a month and a half before the company's launch of the Amos 3, replacing the Amos 1 satellite (shown on the right), which will be retired.

The company released no other details.

"We intend to study the proposal and call a meeting of the board of directors to discuss it. The firm will issue a [public] report once the offer has been reviewed by the board, as legally required," the report said.

On January 3, the controlling shareholder of the Eurocom Group, Shaul Elovitch, announced that he had submitted an offer to increase his holdings in the satellite company.

Eurocom, which owns a 22.8% holding in Space-Communications, offered NIS 46.2 per share, 25.5% above market price at the time, to buy 2.7 million shares, or 23% of the firm's shares.

Space-Communications shares lost 0.4% on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange yesterday, which isn't bad considering that the benchmark index fell by 3.3%. Its market cap yesterdaywas NIS 521 million.