Permira jumps into contest to buy Partner

There's a new contestant in the race to buy the controlling interest in Israeli mobile services company Partner Communications: the pan-European investment fund Permira.

Permira is running in the race solo, without partners. It has commissioned an appraisal of Partner, which operates under the brand name Orange, from the Israeli branch of the McKinsey & Company consultancy.

Permira has been operating since 1985. Its assets are worth something over 80 billion euros.

According to Permira's Web site its investments include a formerly Israeli company, NDS, in which it has invested about 2 billion euros. It also invested 13 billion euros in Denmark's main telecoms company, TDC, and put 12 billion euros into Freescale Semiconductor. Its technology holdings continue with the pan-European broadcast company ProSiebenSat.1 Media and the British media production company All3Media.

The fund is chaired by Damon Buffini, who ranked third in The Times' list of the 100 most influential people in British business scene.

Other contenders in the race to buy the 51% controlling interest in Partner from its Hong Kong owner, Hutchison Whampoa, include Shaul Elovitch's telecoms group Eurocom, Ishay Davidi's private equity fund FIMI, and Ilan Ben-Dov's company Scailex.

In other Partner news, during its six months of activity in landline telephone service, the company recruited 20,000 customers, TheMarker has learned. The number is a downside surprise for industry analysts, who have been predicting that it will reach a quarter-million users within two years. Partner refused to elaborate on the figures, commenting only that it is satisfied with them and that they meet its business plan. The company began offering the service on January 1.

It recruited about the same number for its Internet service, launched together with fixed-line telephony.

On the upside, its pace of subscriber recruitment has picked up. In June, Partner signed up 5,000 new users for its fixed-line telephony service, possibly because of a sales campaign that offers the first three months for free.